Planning A Weaving Project: Part 1

Susan Bateman and Melissa Parsons of the Yarn Barn of Kansas have been sharing their warping and weaving methods in recent issues of Handwoven as part of the Best Practices series. That has included winding a warp, threading and sleying, winding on and tensioning a warp, and in our most recent issue, May/June 2022, finding and fixing errors on and off the loom. Here is their advice for starting a project from scratch, which includes narrowing the wide range of choices and some preliminary calculations in preparation for creating a workable draft. This, too, will be offered in a series, this being the first part of three. —Susan

Planning a weaving project can be daunting because there are so many variables. If you take into account the variety of yarns available, structure alternatives, dimension options, and color possibilities, the permutations for any project are almost endless. There are probably just as many ways of planning a project. We plan lots of projects every year, and this is our method. [PAYWALL]

1. Consider your constraints, yarn choices, and desired structure.

Contraints
Start out by reviewing your constraints, such as:
- Number of shafts on your loom
- Loom weaving width
- Reed or heddle sizes and number of heddles you have available
- Time available to complete the project

Yarn choices
Choose a yarn that is appropriate for your project, taking into account:
- Washability
- Durability
- Warmth
- Absorption/breathability
- Drape
- Cost
- Sett (number of ends per inch (epi) in the reed or heddle and number of picks per inch (ppi))
- Available colorways

Structure
You don’t have to start from scratch; instead, find something you like either in the form of a draft or a project and then modify it to suit your needs. Good sources are:
- Projects in books, magazines like Handwoven or Little Looms, or other published patterns.
- Books of drafts such as Handweaver’s Pattern Directory, A Handweaver’s Pattern Book, or The Weaver’s Book of Eight Shaft Patterns, to name only a few!
- Online resources such as Handwovenmagazine.com, Handweaving.net, or Pinterest.

2. Narrow the plan.

Draft out the details.
If you have found a yarn you like and have a few ideas for structures you would like to try, start sketching out some of the details. Try creating a hypothetical project and testing it for problems. Weaving software that produces a drawdown is invaluable at this stage for helping visualize a project and for catching issues. Even inexpensive programs for tablets can render color drawdowns and check the draft for problems such as excessive float length. You can also work in the old-school way with pencils and graph paper.

Determine a likely sett.
Many websites and catalogs list the sett for their yarns, so check there first. If you see a range, assume that the smaller number is for plain weave and the larger number is for twill. The Master Yarn Chart is another great source for setts, as are other projects that use the same type of yarn.

Play with sett and pattern.
If you are working from an existing draft, think about how big the motif or repeat will look at the sett you’ve decided on. For example, a single repeat of the overshot pattern “Blooming Leaf” from The Handweaver’s Pattern Book uses 86 ends. At 30 epi, that is just under 3" wide and tall and might work beautifully as a border on a 17" towel, repeating 6 times across the width.

6 repeats of Blooming Leaf would make a beautiful towel border. If sett at 30 epi, it would be about 3" tall.

At 12 epi, that same repeat is 7" wide. You would have only about 2.5 repeats across a 17" towel, and your border would be 7" tall. If you wanted to use the same overshot pattern to weave a scarf, you would have only one repeat across the warp for a 7" scarf or two repeats for a 14" scarf. If 7" is too narrow or 14" too wide for the scarf you envision, you need to either pick a pattern that has fewer ends per repeat or pick a thinner yarn with a closer sett. Your other option is to add partial repeats, which we will cover in the next installment.

One repeat of blooming leaf sett at 12 epi would be about 7" wide. It could make a pretty scarf, but there would be long floats to worry about.

Keep track of float length.
A second issue related to how sett and structure interact is float length. This refers to the number of warp ends a weft pick jumps over or under or the number of picks a warp end floats over or under. In the example of the blooming leaf design, there is an 8-end float. At 30 epi, that float is just over ¼", which would be acceptable for a towel border. At 12 epi, that 8-end float is ⅔" long—probably too long because of the risk of it snagging and damaging the fabric.

3. Make the elements fit.

Calculating the number of repeats is a good starting point in determining whether what you are planning is going to work. Start with what you know: the approximate width you’d like, the sett, and the number of ends in the repeat.

Example:
Towel using Blooming Leaf motif, 86 ends per repeat, sett at 30 epi
- Approximate width: 18"
- Multiply approximate width by epi: 18 x 30 = 540 ends
- Divide total ends by ends per repeat: 540 ÷ 86 = 6.279 repeats
- Remove the fractional repeat: 6 repeats
- Multiply ends per repeat by repeats: 86 x 6 = 516 ends
- Divide new total ends by epi: 516 ÷ 30 = 17.2" width in the reed

Watch for the next installment of this series. It will cover making patterns symmetrical and complete, balanced weaves (epi=ppi), and finishing.