Samples? Check!

 

Single strand of Harrisville yarn

GIST Array woven, up close and personal

Scarf woven from GIST Array

Today was a bitty day.  A bit of this, a bit of that...

One of the things I wanted to do was install my digital microscope onto my new laptop, but the microscope only had a CD and the new laptop didn't have a CD drive.  But, my old laptop had a CD Drive, so I copied the file from the CD to a thumb drive on it and installed the microscope onto the new laptop using the thumb drive.

That makes it sound easy, but it took a while.  Then I tried to figure out how to share my new laptop screen to the classroom smart screen at the Olds College.  Which also took a lot longer than I hoped.

So even though I'd gotten the last two samples woven earlier in the afternoon, it was after 4 before I got two of the samples wet finished and only just now finished giving them a hard press.

The yarn tracked in the plain weave sections, which I had pretty much expected.  And it's fairly stiff at 20 epi, so for maximum drape and softness, weaving this yarn in twill would be my recommendation.  However, if someone wanted to weave garment fabric for a tailored garment, the plain weave would work well, I think.  And the tracking would make the cloth interesting because it tracked consistently, so it looks like a really 'fancy' twill.  

To test the microscope I looked at a single strand of Harrisville which clearly shows that the dark grey colour is made up of mostly dark black with some lighter fibres to give the tweedy appearance.  You can also see how disorganized the fibres are in comparison to the GIST Array in the middle photo.  A function of how the fibres have been prepared and spun,.

I'll be writing up my process of working with the Array for the School of Sweet Georgia, plus I had enough warp to weave them a set of samples for the store.  The samples that I wet finished are drying now and I should be able to get them into the mail next week so they will have them to show their customers.  Nothing like being able to fondl...er, feel the actual cloth.

One thing that did kind of surprise me is that the natural didn't shrink as much as the dyed Array.  You can just see the rippling in the stripe of white yarn across the warp in the weft in the above photo.  Since it's a scarf, I'm not too bothered by it, but I might if the cloth was intended for sewing a garment.  If the white was used not in a solid stripe but mixed in with other colours, it would be fine, but in the stripe it tends to behave as it wishes.

Anyway, I now have enough information to start getting the warp ready for the Olds class.  I'll do that just as soon as I hear from the college.  I'll also place an order for the rest of the yarn needed for the class.  Once it comes, I'll turn the skeins into cones to make it easier to work with.  I don't want my students to be spending the coin of their time wrestling with skeins when I have a cone winder and can make things easier/more efficient so that they have more time for learning.

Last I heard the class was full with a waiting list, but I don't want to spend more money before I've got the confirmation.  Truth be told I should have waited to buy the Array for the class, but I wanted to sample it and I was in the store so it was just too tempting to buy the yarn then and there and save the shipping.  :)

Currently reading Murder with Peacocks by D. Andrews