I am not averse to taking inspiration from others and have a library of resources to draw from. That doesn't mean I can't or don't come up with something out of my own brain, just that sometimes it is faster to thumb through a book or something until I find something that looks pleasing to me, then tweak it to my own purposes.
A weaving draft is not a set-in-stone kind of thing, but more of a concept drawing. How one applies that, the colours one chooses, the density, the fibres...all will make my interpretation of a draft quite different from someone else's.
I have also been working with another weaver, working up her concept into finished cloth. Last week she sent me a draft that she had gotten from another weaver, tweaked to her purposes, which I then crunched to make it work for the specific requirements of her project.
When I thought about the yarns I had pulled for another tea towel warp, I looked at the draft I'd been working with - a four shaft overshot profile draft, and thought...hmm.
Then I tweaked it to become a twill block (turned twill) weave structure and adjusted the blocks to fit my intended warp width/length.
Creativity is not completely individual insofar as we take in our surroundings, get input from others, from books, magazines, on-line resources. It is how we apply those resources to our own requirements.
Nature is a wonderful resource, full of inspiration. One of the things I am missing this year is the drive through the Rocky Mountains. The lines in the sides of the mountains can look like fancy twills. The vegetation can be texture. The colours change with the seasons, sometimes in surprising ways. The drive gives me ample time to just drink it all in, especially if I'm doing the drive on my own.
But not this year.
Hopefully things will be better next year.
In the meantime, there is the internet. There is working with other weavers.
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