Iterations

 

After posting about how long it may take to develop a draft, lo, gaze upon this one - which took 6 iterations and about 6 plus hours to get to this stage.  (It may have been longer, I spent nearly two hours just on this one.)

The design is quadruples and isn't actually how I wanted it, but as close as I could come before my patience ran out.  Even so, I was just about to dump the whole file, but after taking a long break, went back and suddenly saw how I could make it work.  Even though it wasn't exactly what I wanted.

It's not 'perfect' - the squares aren't exactly 'square' but I did what I set out to do and finally made something I want to weave to see how it turns out after wet finishing.

This is what creative people do.  They don't pull designs like this out of the hat (usually) on the first 'go'.  This is where I am at after working with this weave structure for about 20 months.  It took that long to explore the potential, weave some simple designs, watch how the designs developed as I tried this, then that, kept looking at how the drafts were formed, pushing the design lines this way, then that.

This draft is #6 in the 'tile' series, but there were plenty of rejects in between 1 through 6.

I am nearing the end of this series.  The current warp, then 3 more, and I should be 'done' using up the majority of my 2/16 cotton yarns.  I may return to doing towels in 2/16 at some point, but I also have a deep stash of rayons (bamboo, Tencel, bog standard rayons) and the only real use for those will be scarves and/or shawls.  Since I'm out of shawls, I will do a warp or several, and try to use up some of my rayon stash.  

While I am still struggling to carry on, being off the opioids means my brain is functioning better and I'm feeling...restless...and wanting to deal with some of the chaos my life is currently in.  A house that is too 'dirty', too cluttered, even for my low standards and desperately needs to be dealt with.  

Spinning and bobbin lace, languishing for far too long, and *also* with deep stashes.  I'm just about ready to put the puzzles away and drag out my bobbin lace stuff.  I will be offering one-on-one tasters for anyone interested in bobbin lace, which means I have to refresh my skills in that area.  

Really understanding how a weave structure works and being able to manipulate the threads to create something 'new' generally comes after a great deal of thought and then good old fashioned work, with plenty of 'rejects'.  

In our current society, people tend to want 'instant gratification', when sometimes it takes a whole lot of brain squeezing and thought.  And to be willing to say nope, that isn't what I want, how do I get to where I want to be from where I am?  IOW, accepting 'failure' and trying something different, something new, something based on what has gone before.

This is how working in a series actually functions.  I don't expect to make something truly 'original' my first 'go' or even my 10th, as this series shows clearly.  I think this is warp 15 or 16 in the series, and it is only now beginning to be something more than working with the obvious twill lines and becoming something unique.

Am I saying no one else in the history of weaving has done this before?  Absolutely not.  But it is unique to me, and I have had to really work my brain to get to this point.

Elizabeth Zimmerman would say that she had 'un-vented' something when she came up with something new/unique in her experience.

I will claim that I have 'un-vented' this design in this weave structure.

If anyone is interested in how this weave structure works, I wrote about it and included skeleton drafts and tie-ups in Stories from the Matrix.  Because you can't copyright a draft, it is just a set of potentials.  What you do with it will be something new and unique to you.

And that's what this is all about, to me.  

(still two signed copies of Stories in my ko-fi shop)