Sunday, January 18, 2015

Winter Workshop: Day 7

Well, I started today with an injury! I've been breaking the weft threads by hand when I've been changing them, and this morning I wondered why it hurt :


Well, it hurt because the linen in the thread had cut my skin on the side of my finger, somewhat similar to a paper cut. Ouch!

I carried on with the plain weave copying the pattern of the warp threads as weft.



Towards the end, I changed how I beat the fabric, and I much prefer the tighter beat. It's far more even.



However, I had misinterpreted the expectation of the weekend. I thought by the end I needed to have some of my 8 swatches done, and actually, I needed to have tried all sorts of different effects and patterns with different yarns this weekend, as I was gently reminded by my tutor (oops).

By this stage I had very little weaving time left before the group critique, where we had to present our work and comment on everyone else's. Oops again.

Just time to try another weft rib across 4 warp threads, but this time in two alternating colours, so it builds up alternating blocks (here in the sandalwood and green). I might try this again to match the colour study but adding a thin grey into the green and swapping the sandalwood for dark natural. I also tried a 4/4 twill in two different colours. First I used the green slub which is in my warp, which really mimics the diagonal lines in the shell. Then I switched to a thicker yarn, to see the effect of using a different weight yarn. It really pops with the thicker yarn.




Finally I used a very thin grey thread used with three strands held together to try satin (bottom, just above the green) and sateen (top).
 
 


I still have lots more things to try from my notes, but I'll be taking a break now as I've left the loom (aka Harris Tweed aka The Beast) at college - no way could I take that back on the train! I'll pick him up later on in the week. Before I do, I'd better make some space in my work room, or he'll never fit in...

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