A weaver friend was explaining weave structures to me the other day. I’m a newbie weaver, it was a long discursive chat, and at the end of it I came away with one thought: I'd be happy weaving twill the rest of my life!
I can admit it: not every skein of handspun yarn turns out as well as I’d envisioned. In fact, there’s the occasional skein that is downright unsightly.
What's the best way to strengthen your selvedges? Madelyn has the answers!
You can always start a weaving project from scratch: dream one up, find a draft. I do that, but I often use Handwoven to jump-start my projects, whether it is to explore a color combination I like or try a weave structure or yarn I’m not familiar with.
One of my absolute favorite books as a teen was The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams. It taught me to always bring a towel, although now as a weaver, I might amend that to always bring a shawl.
Tien Chiu is an award-winning designer and weaver, evident in her Flower Scarves from Handwoven May/June 2018. Based on colors from a photograph of flowers, Tien carefully planned a striped warp that highlighted her chosen colors.
For weft threads that interlace less often than in a balanced plain weave, the weft angle will need to be less steep. Experiment, following the steps outlined here until you find the angle that works.
It made me think about some of the weaving opinions you hear about today that I believe don’t actually hold up to scrutiny.
Deanna Deeds is one of my favorite weaving designers. She brings a fresh, insightful approach to all of her weaving projects, solving problems as she goes. The Plaid Windows Blouse by Deanna, found in Handwoven May/June 2018, is no exception.
I read the patterns for a project and one of the things that confuses me is, say you have a 12-dent reed and you are told to put two ends in a dent to make it 24 ends. Now what do you do with these when it comes to putting them through the heddles?