Dyeing · Weaving

August – Part I

Weaving

August is racing away, I don’t know how we are already over halfway through the month. The weather has been wet and cold so it’s been good to be inside weaving. First up are some photos of the double weave scarves that I mentioned in my last post.

Each scarf has a wintery phrase woven in morse code, from left to right they are: “It’s Cold Outside”, “Wrap Up Warm” and “Looks Like Rain”. The right hand side of the photo shows the full front and back of “Looks Like Rain”. They were on display at “Gathering”, a collection of works by members of the Franklin Arts Festival committee. It was held at the Franklin Arts Centre, Community Gallery from 3-22 August.

The tea towels are finally off my Mecchia loom and are now waiting for me to hem them.

Last week I put a cotton warp on my Ashford jack loom and wove some woven shibori pieces using the techniques from Catharine Ellis’ book “Woven Shibori”. I wove four pieces with a cotton warp and two with a polyester weft. On Saturday my local weaving group had an indigo dyeing workshop and I dyed all the cotton weft pieces and one of the polyester weft pieces. I dyed both polyester weft pieces with Rit Dyemore dye as well and steamed them to set the pleats.

Woven shibori pieces on the loom
Handwoven pleated purple coloured pieces hanging on a branch,
Cotton warp and polyester weft, the piece on the left was first dyed with indigo before both were dyed with Rit Dyemore dye.
Cotton warp and weft

Dog Tales

Rufus is now 6 months old and continues to keep us on our toes as everyday he finds something new that he can reach. He loves playing with his balls and running around.

Dyeing · Weaving

The rest of May

Weaving

I have finished weaving a couple more of the double weave accordion books, one with four sections and one with six. Handwoven using 2 ply corriedale yarn dyed with harakeke seedpods, the books are fun to play with and rearrange into new shapes.

Handwoven sculpture

Rufus

We have gone to the beach at low tide a few times with Rufus while we waited for him to be fully immunised for parvo. This week we are finally able to go walking in public with him which is great and will hopefully help burn off some of his energy.

Dyeing · Weaving

May 2022 so far

Weaving

The tea towels in the last post have been washed but still need to be hemmed. There has been much moving of stuff and rearranging looms in my studio so not much actual weaving. I have finished the double weave projects on my table loom and have a few ideas on what to do differently next time.

On my jack loom I’ve started weaving the Monk’s Belt placemats from Season 6, episode 3 of the Jane Stafford School of Weaving.

Dyeing

We had a fun day trying indigo dyeing at the weaving group I belong to, here’s one of the silk pieces I dyed using resists.

Reading

The latest instalment in the Rivers of London / Peter Grant series.