Reading Drafts part V

 

Doris Goerner

charting Bedford Cord

More textbooks, this time contemporary, presented by Doris Goerner.  These books are from the UK so be aware that where Brighton Honeycomb is listed, we would call that waffle weave.  

These books have very little text and large clear illustrations of various weave structures.  I think they were developed as additional/supplemental information for classes Ms Goerner taught.  There are brief explanations, as in this one that says Bedford Cord can be developed without 'cutting ends' but the ribs will be less prominent.  And then shows a draft without the cutting ends to compare how that looks.

I would expect that people who learn best from seeing or doing rather than reading would find these helpful.  Volume one covers the 'simpler' weaves, while Volume two goes into the more complex weave structures, usually with more layers - double weave, pique, etc.  With very little text, I was able to concentrate on what was happening with the threads, and then do some designs of my own using these to jump off from.

I did do Bedford cord in several fabrics and chose to weave them upside down in order to lift the fewest number of shafts.

It was while reading Watson's book (I think) that I learned that Bedford cord was commonly used for durable fabrics for things like riding jodhpurs.  I took that idea of using it for clothing fabric, did a silk warp with a fairly open density, used a fine wool/cashmere for weft and wove the above fabric for a swing coat.  Normally the long floats on the back side make the weave structure not the best choice for clothing, but after fulling the fabric wool/cashmere fulled nicely and the floats on the inside were not an issue.  It was also fine enough threads that the floats were not very long.  My mother wore this jacket in quite cold weather said she was kept warm.

This cloth was woven in a much heavier thread than the swing coat and the floats on the back were much longer.  I didn't have enough shafts to do cutting ends, plus I didn't want really deep ribs because the cloth was turned into placemats for a friend.  The ribs trapped air in the channels and helped to protect her wooden table from hot pots and plates.  The placemats were backed with a commercial fabric and the edges were bound with the same fabric.  

Drafts are just maps to a location.  It might be where we want to go, or close to it.  Or it may spark our interest and lead us to completely new and unexpected places.

The more we understand about how threads can go together to create a cloth, the better able we are to figure out what it is we want, and how to get there.  I would not recommend these books to a very new weaver because they work 'best' (imho) for someone who already has a general understanding of the various 'common' weave structures.  OTOH, some people visualize things very well from graphic representation so I don't discourage anyone from acquiring any resource that they feel might be useful.

Many of the books in my library rarely see the light of day.  For example, I haven't pulled the Goerner books off the shelf in years.  However, I know they are there and when I need to look at them, they are literally at my fingertips.  And you can probably tell from the post-it notes poking out the edges that yes, I can and do use them.  Sometimes it's just to refresh my memory, sometimes it's to look more deeply into a weave structure that I may not have used before but am contemplating now.  Sometimes it's just plain curiosity.

Acquiring knowledge is never a waste of time because you never know when it might come in handy.