I did get a lot of fibery things done this weekend, though they are mostly of the invisible variety.  Well, not entirely invisible, but...

 

From the kilogram of 30/2 I got from Tien on cones, I wound numerous smaller hanks.  Each hank is 400 yards.  This is a significant though manageable size; Diderot mentions in his Encyclopédie that the skeins should be kept 'mince' (thin) in order to reduce tangle and loss, so I'm trying this out as a method.  It's not much work winding into the 400-yard skeins.  They are piling up, glossy and beautiful!

 

I also started warping the satin sampler warp onto Millicent using the AVL Warping Wheel.  Amazing.  While it's true that I was using the WW in what may well be the least advantageous way, that is, winding a very short warp with a very high epi with a single cone, even in this way it is still the best way to go simply because the warp stays under tension.  The same steps would be used to beam a warp of 25 yards that would be used to beam a warp of 3 yards, but the design of the WW is such that I get to totally skip the scary uncertainty of moments during which the warp is not under tension.  With slippery and fine silken warps, this is of utmost importance.

 

Below is the draft I've decided on for Noemi's green scarf.  I've also decided that since I have enough silk, I am going to weave a run of these scarves - five in all, for now, and see how they sell.

 

 

Finally...a photo of young Tom Jones.  Just because.

 

 

The Runner is Finished: Next Project!

The silk dresser scarf/table runner is completed.  I finished weaving it the other day, and took it with me on a brief trip to Drytown (!), CA this weekend and worked on it in our motel room.  I darned in ends, basted a fine silk thread at each end to prevent raveling, wet-finished it, and pressed it. 

 

Of course, I could not help but weave a couple of samples near the end of the warp, as I always like to: more gold thread, more pretend gold thread, etc.  The gold thread samples came out sumptous, of course.  Particularly nice was the interaction between the gold thread and the bright green moegi color, which I hadn't expected.  And of course it looked royally beautiful with the madder red silk.

 

 

 

Over the weekend a friend asked me if she could commission something small for her upcoming wedding this autumn; of course I said yes - to be asked to provide beauty for such a wonderful occasion is always a privilege and a pleasure.  She has asked for 'something small, something that can be hidden in or attached to my bouquet-'.  I'm thinking a tiny reticule purse, or some such, or even a fine silk ribbon.  Perhaps...white silk shot with silver thread, or gold!

Of course, now that the most recent project is completed, I am feeling happily impelled towards the next project.  Next will be the attempt at making nice silk satin, and after that, Noemi's scarf.

Penchant for diamonds



After I posted a photograph of the dresser scarf as I weave it to Facebook, my old friend Peter sent me the first photo below - it is a photo of my first tablet weaving ever, done in 1986.  I'd been weaving for years by then, but by backstrap loom and floor loom; I'd never done tablet weaving before.  You can see plenty of rough spots and errors if you look below!!  

 

Peter has been wearing it as a wristband since 1986.  Wow.

 

You can see that I have a penchant for red thread, and diamond patterns!!

 

Below here is an incidental photo of the dobby chain with its pegs in placement for the elaborate 16-harness point twill I've got on the loom presently.