Looking Ahead - Cautiously

possible yarns for next warp - tea towels with Fox Fibre weft

possible draft for towels

I think I'm on scarf #7 with a possibility of either 9 or 10 scarves on this warp.  The silk warp went onto the loom at 20 turns (nominally 20 yards) and I've been weaving each scarf about 72" plus the fringes so with loom waste, samples, etc., I'm pretty sure the warp will only give me 9 scarves.

Therefore, it's about time I started thinking, at least tentatively, about the next warp.

I'm finding each cycle is knocking the stuffing out of me a little bit more, just as warned, so I decided to do something a little less challenging than the baby wraps.  Not to mention that early feedback from field tests is indicating that a bit more tweaking needs to be done in terms of construction, so before I invest any more time and materials in making more wraps I want to fine tune them.

One of the things I concentrate on when designing cloth is the function the fabric is to perform.  I've never worn a baby wrap so I have no personal experience of the wear and tear they need to withstand.  I did the best I could with the limited knowledge of wraps that I had but it seems they need to be constructed (and by this I mean the sewing, not the weaving) to be more sturdy than what I did with the first batch.  I've asked for one of the test wraps back so I can apply a couple of options and then give the wrap back to the tester for more feedback.

In the meantime I realized that in spite of weaving dozens of tea towels the last 5 years I have very few left in stock so it seems tea towels are the way to go.  :)  I gave free tea towels away with purchases of Magic and there are not a lot left on the shelf.  I do have half a dozen or so more to hem, but....

Since I have a great deal of Fox Fibre yarn to use up the next warp will be a mixed or blended one (not stripes) of different colours. 

While I do have more 2/20 merc. cotton on hand, the colours are too dark in value for this warp.  If I went with the darkest value colours I feel the tea towels would be too dark to be appealing.  So I'll keep those darker values for baby wraps, if I decide to continue developing that textile.  Actually I'm not entirely sure I'll put that blue in the warp.  It's just dark enough that it might make the cloth look streaky.  Which is one reason why I'm thinking about the next warp now so I can mull over my options. 

If I drop the blue I'll probably increase the green and darker beige.  With such a fancy twill weave structure I don't want visual stripes or streaks, but rather a more blended colour appearance.  Then I'll use the darker value Fox Fibre shades so that there is some contrast between the lighter value warp and the darker value weft so that the weave structure shows as the pattern in the cloth.

Currently reading In A Gilded Cage by Rhys Bowen