ozweaver – Page 44

Whirlwind Tour of NEWS in a Summer that is Zipping Past

July 19, 2015 | Leave a Comment

This year I decided against registering for NEWS, New England Weavers’ Seminar. Instead, I thought I would make a day visit and include some good friends from my old stomping ground in New York and New Jersey. I would give them a little taste of NEWS just before their own regional conference, MAFA (Mid-Atantic Fiber Association) began.

Here we are at the end of the day….a bit worse for wear, but so happy to be together and to have been so inspired by all the exhibits at the conference.

We had a terrific time at NEWS, although I did feel a twinge of regret when I saw that Margo Selby was offering a class in double weave. Take a look at the work she exhibited in the faculty show. Who wouldn’t want to study with her??

Maybe I should start with the faculty show… This is Barbara Herbster’s work.

This is a repweave table runner by Lucienne Coifman from my own guild in Connecticut. She is a superlative teacher, and someday I hope to study rep with her.

The Gallery Exhibit is always exciting, and I was particularly excited this year! I won 5 awards for my tapestry “Sunset on Wilson Cove.” It is most likely the last time I’ll exhibit this piece so I was pleased that it had quite a swan song. The three awards that blew me away are “1st Place Tapestry and Transparency,” “Judges’ Choice,” and “Peoples’ Choice.” I am thrilled! The other two are “First Time Entrant at NEWS” and “Best in Tapestry from the Textile Arts Center.” Can you tell how happy and surprised I am!

We all loved the upholstered footstool right below my tapestry, woven by Susan Wright. What great use of color. It’s a beauty.

This stunning runner caught all our eyes. Ruth Buchman manged to create a threading that is mirrored but gives such sense of assymetry. Then her color choices were superb–greys and blacks with just the right touch of yellow that also gave a strong impression of assymetry. So the piece has a calm balance in color and weave struture while also giving the impression that it is not symetrical. Brilliantly done!

This is another of Ruth’s pieces in the gallery exhibit. Stunning doubleweave.

This is Sarah Fortin’s double weave fabric. I have no idea how she gets some areas to pleat and rise off the flat surface of the background fabric. Beautiful colors and beautiful weaving.

This piece by Suzi Ballenger is stunning! It has silk cocoons attached to it and the weaving was done with her open top beater tool that allows you to move warps, which creates the warp undulations in the fabric.

This fun–and beautiful– bag, called “Take Me Shopping” is by Karin Borden.

There was also a special exhibit of Mary Merrill’s tapestries woven over the decades from the 1950s when she began weaving until her death in the 1999. Her family generously shares her work at gatherings like NEWS. Look how fresh and lush her colors and her shape making are in these two works. This was when I wished I could be at the conference for the entire weekend, so I could come back and visit more than once!

I’ve only been to NEWS twice now, and both times I have to say that my favorite displays are the guild tables. Unjuried though they may be, the work is excellent, and both times I’ve been so inspired that I simply cannot take it all in.

Each guild chooses a theme for their display. This year one guild did textiles inspired by Frank Lloyd Wright, another displayed projects woven by one of their members who has passed away, and another guild woven projects based on personal memories. There was a guild whose inspiration was gardening. I have a photo of a curtain called “Spinach and Blackberry Salad” from that display. Our guild did a display of handbags based on the project that Area 4 did last year of weaving lunch bags and matching napkins to coordinate with a mug that belonged to someone else in the group. It was a grab bag choosing of mugs, and then you designed and wove the lunch bag and napkin to give the member who owned the mug you selected. It was such a wonderful way to weave for someone else, and it honed our design skills along with our weaving skills. My lunch bag was not part of the display since I gave it away last summer, but I have been so intrigued with making bags lately that I submitted my newly finished large tote bag for this display. My photo makes the bags look like a bit of a jumble, and the lighting was harsh. It was actually far more striking than it looks here.

Connecticut Guild’s display of Area 4 lunch totes and handbags.

The Frank Lloyd Wright display.

I think the next image may have been from a picnic themed project, although if so, I missed reading the details of what this group’s theme was. Lovely weaving!– a basket tote and a handwoven band for your stawhat.

“Spinach Salad with Blackberries” from the gardening inspired display.

Stunning tableware woven by Jo Ann Miner.

None of us supported the vendors as we should have. I hope they fared better with other visitors. I was looking for some fine silk to add to my upcoming project for plaited huck blouse fabric, but no one had what I needed. I have some fine tussah silk from my stash as well as some silk I got last summer at Convergence from a vendor called “SanJo.” I want to get the warp on sometime in August so I can get the fabric woven in time for a workshop in October with Sarah Fortin on sewing with handwoven fabric.

Why am not tackling that warp sooner?– BECAUSE we have our son’s wedding in less than three weeks! I am feeling rather confident about my two wedding projects–the ring pillow is done!

And here is my wedding outfit. The blouse is a vogue pattern for a boatneck tunic sewn by a wonderful seamstress in Amston, CT. I then embellished it with silk ribbon embroidery to coordinate with the brown silk pants.

Want to see a closeup? I’ll take that as a ‘yes.’

And to top off the outfit I am having some ballet slippers embroidered by a woman in Altanta who has an Etsy shop called AJuneBride. My shoes will look something like this.

Well, I let this get absurdly long so I’ll stop for now even though I had lots more to say… next post.

Memories of Lace Weekend….

July 8, 2015 | 3 Comments

It seems like a year ago that I spent a wonderful weekend at the New England Lace Retreat in Wareham, MA–but it was mid-May–just 6 weeks ago.

My photo makes this house look rather imposing! It was actually very inviting, full of lovely antique and vintage furniture. Those two large windows on main floor of the front are two generous ‘parlours’ where our classes were held. To the rear was a large dining room where we had our meals. For three meals each day someone would ring a bell to invite us to gather in the dining room. My bedroom was on the 3rd floor, the window all the way to the left in the photo. Since my room was in the corner it also had a side window with a lovely view of the pond. This house sits right on the the bay side of Cape Cod. It is quite a spot!

There was a wonderful glass enclosed porch at the right side of the house (not visible in my photograph) where we could congregate to work on our projects. Some people chose not to take a class and spent their time on the porch working on projects they brought with them from home.

During the weekend I learned a bit about Idrija lace from Allie Marguccio, who also gave a stunning presentation on her apprenticeship in Slovenia. In this photo our revered teacher, Allie, is the top most person on the right. Can you find me in the topmost left?? My good friend and amazing lace mentor, Mary, has been obscured behind two heads on that top row with me. Mary! She has the patience of Job with me, and she is a very accomplished lace maker. I’m sorry you cannot see her. A number of the women in this photo are in my Ct. lace group, and they have all been very supportive of my lack of knowledge! What a great group of women, and what a great weekend we spent together!

Here are a few photos of Allie’s work in Idrija lace. Be prepared to be stunned!

I’ve never seen a lace covered box before. And how about this lovely heart surrounding a flower and the necklace in progress on Allie’s pillow?

You really need to see a close up of the heart project! This project is a good example of both the wide tapes and narrow tapes used in Idrija lace. The wide tapes are made with whole stitch and the narrow tapes are linen stitch.

What intrigues me most is using this lace to adorn clothing.

With that in mind, I am making a small project that can be used to edge a neckline. I don’t think I’ll ever use this project on a garment, but it has been a good learning exercise.

That is my new bolster pillow for making Idrija lace, and my new bobbins which are bigger than the bobbins used for the types of lace from northern Europe. I am enjoying working on a bolster. And here is a close up, showing why this project will never be used on clothing. It’s not ready for prime time….but I have learned a LOT!

As you can see, Idrija lace is a tape lace, using linen stitch for the narrow tape. The tapes get connected with ‘winkies’– a new term for me–which are loops that get ‘sewn’ together. “Sewing” is the term used when you take one bobbin’s thread and put it through the loop of its partner bobbin. You can see ‘winkies’ where the tapes are coming close together. Not something I can show here, but if you are a lace maker you will know what I mean!

Allie’s husband Tom makes the bolster pillows which are stuffed with sawdust and are quite heavy, and he turns the pretty bobbins. Allie makes the cotton covers. You can find them both here.

Allie share with us a good website for ordering traditional Idrija patterns from Slovenia. So many patterns to look at, you will need a couple of hours to peruse them all. I have ordered a number of patterns for embellishing clothing, and I hope I’ll be ready to tackle one of them when they arrive!

6-Block, 8-Shaft Plaited Huck Tote Bag

July 6, 2015 | 2 Comments

The draft for this pattern is from a workshop Laurie Autio gave our guild in fall of 2014, called “Designing for Block Weaves Using Twills as Profiles.” In the post I wrote I about this I called it a ‘blended draft’ which Laurie says it is NOT! So I’m not certain what to call the procedure of taking a twill circle (1-2, 2-3, 3-4, 4-5…etc) and using that sequence as a profile draft for plugging in a different weave structure, such as huck.

Here is the plaited twill draft that was used for the profile:

Here is the draft. The huck draft of little sections of 5-thread repeats that create either a weft float or warp float are threaded according to the twill pattern above. There has to be a better way to say this, and when I find it I will rewrite!

I wanted a subtle woven huck fabric so for the warp I used three very close colors of 2-ply wet spun linen whose weight is a bit heavier that 16/2 linen. I’m sorry I cannot say exactly what it is. I have a large stash of unlabeled linen cones of linen and silk cones from a dear weaving mentor, and none of them are labeled!

WARP
Laurie recommended that I give the McMorran yarn balance information about the yarns I used. I have never felt confident in trusting this little device. When I perform the procedure on the same yarn multiple times I never get the same number! My three warp yarns gave me a range of yardages from 1325 yards per pound (ypp) to 1750 ypp. They are slightly different grists, so it is conceivable that their yardages would be somewhat different, but a difference of over 400 ypp is a bit untrustworthy to me. And here is another reason that it is hard for me to trust this little gadget! My cones of linen are thicker than 16/2 Bockens linen, yet they also look like they have less twist. That might make them lighter weight in spite of looking thicker. Yardage for 16/2 linen is 2700 ypp, and my ‘thicker’ yarns ranged from 1325 – 1750 ypp.

I made the warp by holding the three yarns together, separated between my fingers. I put the spools on a spool holder and ran the yarns up to a hook in the ceiling and then down to my finger tensioning technique. I made a 1 x 1 cross since the yarns are a little hairy and I didn’t trust having adjacent yarns in the same cross. My warp was sett at 12 epi, and sleyed 2-per-dent in a 6-dent reed. The warp was 25″ wide and I used my Baby Wolf for this project. The pattern repeat for this draft is 30 threads. At 12 epi with 10 repeats I needed 300 warp threads, which was 10 pattern repeats across the warp.

WEFT AND WEAVING
The weft is a single ply linen that is rougher than the warp. It has lots of thick and thin areas, so I think the McMorran yarn balance will be even less accurate. I measured three times and averaged my findings for a result of 1900 ypp. I wove to square the pattern. After weaving the necessary yardage for the front and back of the bag, I wove plain weave to the end of the warp for the handles and the top of my lining.

FINISHED FABRIC
I wanted the front and back of the bag to be roughly square before doing the box corner at the bottom. I have a tote that I made from commercial fabric that I cut 24″ square to begin and I love the proportions of that bag. I knew I would not get a finished fabric 24″ wide on the Baby Wolf, so I thought I would just use whatever width I did end up with for making my size determination. After washing the width of the bag was about 20″. I put in cutting lines (two plain weave picks in a contrasting yarn) after weaving 24″. I thought the shrinkage would be greater lengthwise than in the width, but my cutting lines ended up longer than my fabric was wide. If I had not woven in these cutting lines, I could have changed the proportions of my bag. With the cutting lines I put in, the bag became somewhat taller than it is wide.

This photo was taken after I machine washed the fabric on a normal setting and set outside to dry. You can see the cutting lines and where I switched to plain weave (at the top of the photo) for the handles and part of the lining. I used a commercial linen fabric for the lining; it is brown/tan/black plaid that you can see in the little loop for the button in the next photo.

SEWING THE TOTE BAG
You can use the directions I wrote for the smaller tote bag that I made last summer, changing the size of the pieces you cut to match your fabric, roughly 20″ wide by 22″ long.

For this particular bag I used the directions below. After some thought (and because I did not have enough handwoven fabric!) I decided to omit the zipper that is detailed in the beginning of this video. I am now happy that I decided to omit the zipper since the bag opens wider with only a button and loop closure. The contstuction method for this bag has different order of sewing the pieces than my written instructions from the previous bag, and I just loved having the handwoven fabric at the top of the lining. I think that is more professional looking.

Confluence

June 29, 2015 | Leave a Comment

Once again, it’s been a month since I’ve posted here, and usually when that happens I’ve been writing posts in my head for weeks and weeks before finally getting to a keyboard. Not this time–I haven’t even thought about posting. Old age? Beginning senility? I’m dancing as fast as I can and the music is still accelerating!

The past month has been quite a confluence of all the facets of my life. Don’t we all have competing interests and obligations that keep us juggling things to try and get just the right mix? Too long without weaving and I become cranky; at the same time too much solitude in my studio and my hermitic tendencies start to drag me down.

The two big June events in my life were Bob’s 60th birthday, which he glided through like a swan. He doesn’t look or act a day older, and he enjoyed getting together with some of his dearest friends to celebrate the landmark. I still have more than 6 months to go, and I am feeling older and older each day. Hmmm….

Last week Bob and another local sailor hosted a large sailing event for the Seven Seas Cruising Association. George and Bob put on a three day conference with speakers and social time, a fancy dinner at a yacht club, and a dinghy raft up on the river. It was a lot of work, but something both men really enjoy. I sort of go along for the ride, although I did have a house full of overnight guests and made some breakfasts and one rather large dinner for 12!

Here we are with in our den with two couples who have helped us immensely in getting used to living aboard. Both of these couples live aboard full time, unlike Bob and I who only live onboard during the winter months. They are truly nomads.

And here is the young man who gives all the live aboards their daily weather information. This is the man who kept us safe through hurricane Sandy two years ago, and has kept us safe through many other storms over the past 3 years! He was our honored house guest for the weekend, and he even used Bob’s office to broadcast his daily weather information over SSB radio. He had some way of connecting to his radio tower in Florida in order to do the broadcast. The amazing Chris Parker:

While both these events were fun, I have not had any time to work on tapestry or fabric weaving. I have certainly had some important ‘thought time’ making plans for two projects that I will put on a couple of my floor looms. Hopefully I can finish weaving at least one of these before we leave again at the holidays. More on that in a bit….

After the guests left I turned my attention back to the linen fabric I took off the Baby Wolf about a month ago. I spent some time over the weekend sewing a tote bag. The linen is a medium weight fabric. The warp was a mixture of several colors of a rather thick 2-ply wet spun linen. In the photo below the 3 spools used in the warp are lined up together and the golden colored spool on top is what I used for the weft.

And here is close up of warp threads; you see they are a bit coarse and hairy even though they still have the sheen of wet spun linen.

This is the fabric off the loom in May, drying outside after machine washing. You can see the cutting lines I wove in to help me in making the tote bag. The fabric for the handles and top of the lining is at the top of the photo and is woven in plain weave.

And here is the finished bag.

The draft for this fabric is a blend of plaited twill with huck blocks. It makes plaited huck! How cool is that? I got this draft from Laurie Autio when she gave a talk called “Designing for Block Weaves Using Twills as Profiles” at our guild last fall. This particular design is a 6-Block, 8-shaft structure using huck threading on a base of plaited twill.

My warp was threaded at 12 epi and woven to square. The fabric is close to burlap weight, but not nearly as open as burlap. I am very happy with it. If you weave this structure with a lot of color contrast between the warp and the weft you’ll get a good contrast between the plaited elements, those that go over and those that go under. I am more a fan of subltety, but the downside is that you probably cannot see the plaited effect in my photos. I also blurred the woven effect by using multiple colors in the warp. This is just my preference. It would be quite dramatic woven in two very contrasting colors.

I plan to write up the procedures for weaving this project very soon. Stay tuned!

Wonderful to be HOME!

May 5, 2015 | 2 Comments

It is glorious in southern New England and I am thoroughly enjoying all the perks of living in a house! Laundry! Cooking! Puttering in the dirt! In spite of the harsh winter all my perennials are showing signs of life–except one peony, but I’m pretty sure it had died before last fall’s first frost–and I have scattered some seeds which causes me to excitedly search for signs of germination each morning and evening when I walk around the gardens to take stock of new life emerging. As of this morning I have poppy seedings! Rejoice with me! I plant poppy seeds every year–and never get any. Dare I hope?? Rain is expected tomorrow and I sure hope it will be gentle on my tiny seedlings.

There are a couple of wonderful volunteers in the lawn this year. Some pansies from my window boxes self seeded along the front walk.

There are violets everywhere in the lawn… makes me want to dissuade Bob from mowing. He’s not here now to mow down these sweet gems.

And this is a new volunteer this year, and something completely unknown to me. I have just googled yellow wildflowers in spring and found that this is Leopard’s Bane (Deronicum). It blooms at the same time as daffodils. I hope to transplant this into one of the gardens before Bob arrives home with mowing on him mind…

My first bouquet from the garden….daffs, hellebore and forget me nots on a handwoven runner on my desk where I write these posts at my computer.

And now, along with getting as much weaving done as I possibly can, I am turning my attentions to my older son’s upcoming wedding. It’s time to look for a wedding outfit. I am in the unfortunate, but not so unusual, predicament of having two, yes TWO, mothers of the bride, so my fashion choice must accomodate theirs! Anyway, I have decided to attempt making my own outfit. This decision is entirely based on catching up on two seasons of Downton Abbey since I returned home one week ago. My son calls that ‘binge’ watching–and he’s right!

I am thinking of making a boat neck tunic out of pale to medium blue silk charmeuse and embellinging the neckline with ribbon embroidery….. very like this tunic that Lady Crawley wore in a couple of episodes. (I have a collection of photos of Downton Abbey costumes–taken while pausing the show to snap the pix! I wonder how many others do this too!)

I am imagining trailing vines in greens and browns with some roses and other flowers thrown in (color choices will be based on the overall effect going with my favorite brown silk pants with the pretty Chinese knots that run down the outer leg). I will stop by Banksville Fabrics on my trip to New Jersey later this week. If I can get a lovely blue silk there I will then make a trip to Thistle Needleworks in Glastonbury to get the silk ribbons for the embroidery.

I am also dabbling in some Romanian Point Lace that intrigued me at Saturday’s monthly lace gathering. My friend Mary is trying it and she shared the information that she has found recently. There is a lot on Pinterest, and there are two older issues of Piecework that describe this technique (March/April 1998, and one from 2001).

I must have garments on the brain (too much Downton Abbey for sure!)….I think a border of this lace would be stunning on a tunic. This time I envision a handwoven silk fabric with Romanian Point Lace at the neckline. It would also look wonderful on the collar of a melton wool coat.

So, with puttering in the gardens and doing just the smallest bit of spring cleaning in the house, I have not yet managed to touch any of my looms. As I finish this I plan to bring up my portable easel and get back to my small Portuguese Man of War tapestry that I started on the boat.

Today is a glorious day for weaving outside!

Author name: ozweaver

Whirlwind Tour of NEWS in a Summer that is Zipping Past

Memories of Lace Weekend….

6-Block, 8-Shaft Plaited Huck Tote Bag

Confluence

Wonderful to be HOME!

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