Three looms.

With the arrival of the older AVL dobby loom a couple of weeks ago, I now own three looms.

One is a 2-harness counterbalance loom for weaving Linen; it dates to around 1840 and was made by Norwegian settlers to Minnesota.  I bought it from the family who originally made it.  It's currently in storage, waiting for the day when we have more room to set it up.

The second is a Cranbrook loom, a very sturdy 4-harness countermarche loom I bought in 2002 from a nice person in Grass Valley, CA.  My friend Rosemary transported it for me - we went to pick it up in Grass Valley where she lashed it securely to the roof of her car, and drove it to Haight Street in San Francisco, where I lived at that time. 

Now the AVL joins the family. 

Each of my three looms has a story to it - they're all 'older' looms.  The Norwegian loom is the oldest, followed by the Cranbrook (it's an early Cranbrook, built when the Cranbrook brand still belonged to the Bexell company, in about 1976).  The AVL is an earlier model and dates from around 1979-80.

One of the aspects of this new-to-me AVL that delights me is that it has little clues to its history on it.  The previous owner pointed out some of them to me. 

That it was a prototype is borne out by the little palimpsests of change that still show; holes that were drilled to accomodate bolts were plugged and then redrilled in slightly different positions...there are two warp beams, one a large sectional beam and the other a 'straight' warp beam that was clearly turned carefully by hand (on a large lathe!) and the general appearance of having been well-used.  I loved seeing the parts of the maple loom frame that, long hidden from view under other parts or where the loom frame members joined together, remain pale because they were hidden from light.  Some people might fret about a few scratches and scrapes on the loom but to me these are beautiful...the signs of use.  While it does not have some of the later features of AVL looms, such as the cloth auto-advance, I admire it as a document of how AVL looms were in the early '80s, and I've never had an auto-advance on any of my looms, so it's nothing I would miss.  This loom is still a marvel of excellent engineering on the part of the AVL company; that 35 years later it remains in excellent and functional condition is only a testament of the quality of AVL looms.  

Although this loom is a product of the modern age, it still dates from a period of time when things were 'built to last'.   And I like to think that it somehow retains the poetry of each stroke of the beater and each shed raised over its lifetime, rather how I used to wonder if an old mirror somehow still retained each reflection cast into it over the years. 

I first saw an AVL loom in person in the summer of 1983.  It would have been either this model of AVL loom, or a slightly newer model.  Now one of the early ones stands in our garage studio. 

It's almost completely reassembled.  The frame is together, the mechanical dobby is working again (it came with an early Compu-dobby attached to it but I really wanted to use it with its original mechanical dobby at first), the beams are all in place, and this evening we're planning to hang the harnesses and connect them to the sprung lamms down below.  A friend who has more experience with AVL looms will be coming over this Saturday to troubleshoot (that is, if there is any trouble to troubleshoot!).  I'm planning to put a warp on next week to start on a green silk scarf I promised a friend. 

Altogether I am very jazzed to have this loom - it's a bit of AVL history, it's the history of its three previous owners, and it's a working tool.  I'm quite chuffed that I've been able to assemble it thus far without much assistance.   Many kudos to the most recent owner, who carefully accounted for each and every part down to each screw, bolt, and nut - and who drove it down from Oregon to our fair city on the Bay, and who has generously been available whenever I've had questions during the reassembly.