New Spinners

Yesterday two new spinners/weavers came over to look at the Ashland Bay spinning fibres.

I'd met them the evening before at the guild drop-in where they were working on their inkle looms weaving tapes and/or spinning on drop spindles. :)

One of the local spinners/weavers has been giving classes at the SCA group and has been weaving up a storm herself making SCA appropriate tapes.

It's just great to see interest starting to bubble!

Weaving seems to go through cycles of interest, then subsiding for a while. When I started weaving in 1974 interest was just growing and there was a lot of excitement about it. It seems that it may be growing again - how lovely.

Someone commented that one of the barriers to weaving is the cost of a new loom. In my area there is a surplus of used looms around, but ultimately a full size loom takes up a room. Not everyone has that much room to spare.

However there are small looms - inkle, backstrap, card/tablet weaving, even rigid heddle looms. When I first started weaving I wasn't very interested in the small looms. I was primarily interested in 'fancy' weaving with lots of shafts. :D But the only difference between a loom without shafts, or only a few shafts, and one with lots of shafts is that you can do 'fancy' weave structures more efficiently. If a person is willing to use a pick up stick, there really isn't anything that they can't do.

So one of the things I'll be showing Mizz B how to do is pick up. Right now she can use my 24 shaft lever loom, but when she moves home she will have her 4 shaft Leclerc Fanny and backstrap loom. Knowing how to do pick up will give her the freedom to do lots of 'fancy' things with a minimum of investment in equipment.

The trade off will be that it will take her more time.

Currently reading State Fair by Earlene Fowler