Wide(r) Weaving

So I realized that all of the video clips I've got posted to my blog are of narrow weaving. And since the current warp is a bit wider at 26", thought I'd do another video showing my weaving rhythm on this warp.

You can see that I'm a lot slower due to the simple fact that it takes the shuttle longer to traverse the shed than on a narrower warp.

After watching myself weave during the editing of these clips I was reminded of the poem by Robbie Burns - something about having the gift to see ourselves as others see us? I'm sure he never envisioned video cameras that would allow us just that gift.

Funny the things we focus on. I'm a - hmm - substantial - person (wish I were a little less substantial, but so far haven't been able to change that). Anyway, I got mesmerized by the muscles in my forearm. Not a view that I generally get to see, after all!

During a workshop with Norman Kennedy he showed us slides of the Old People living on one of the remote islands off northern Scotland. I remember him commenting on the women and their forearms.

I think I'd fit right in should I ever visit.

currently reading The Dance of Death by Kate Sedley

Tea Towels for Tien

So here is the first warp for Tien to weave on when she arrives.

Once in a while I do a time study to see how long a particular task takes me. I do this for many reasons - pricing - partly - so I know how much money I should be charging for my wovens. But I also do it for reasons of scheduling - what can I expect to accomplish in a certain time frame?

While I've been happy dressing the Fanny with the warping valet, I had not done a time study for a while, particularly for tea towels.

This warp is a pretty standard format for towels - a bit wider due to the stripe repeat in the warp at 26" in the reed - but using 16/2 cotton at 32 epi, 11 meters long.

I set the rough sleyed reed into the beater at 1:30 pm. At 2:45 pm I was securing the lease sticks in the angel wings.

So 1 hour and 15 minutes to set the warp into the loom attaching it to the apron rod and beam it, including transferring the cross. That's actually a little bit better than I was expecting.

Now to thread, sley and tie on.

Another Weaving Clip

The age old question - do you beat on an open shed? closing shed? closed shed?

I thought I beat on a closing shed until I really started thinking about what I was doing and observing what was actually happening. And then I began thinking that at the moment of impact, the shed was in fact closed.

So I set up the video camera so that it was recording what was happening behind the beater on a level with the warp in order to see.

And now you can, too.

Cold Remedy

Not sure how this raucous variegated got into my stash - lime green isn't one of my fav colours, after all - but it was time to use it up. The rust red weft seems to be taming it quite nicely.

After 5 days of languishing I was getting antsy. My cold has settled into my chest so my brain is functioning - sort of - and I decided to try to sweat my cold out by weaving. Rayon chenille is straight forward to weave anyway so thought I'd get cracking. There are 4 more wound warps ready and waiting for me, and I'd like to get them all done before I set the Fanny up for the tea towel warp for Tien (who is arriving next Thursday!)

Not feeling well my patience is at a low ebb and I got a bit exercised over a thread on one of the chat groups I belong to where people were, once again, decrying the use of mechanical assistance and when the line can be drawn about a textile being 'hand' woven or not.

I suspect the chasm between hand weavers and power loom weavers began during the Industrial Revolution. Hand weavers were being displaced by power looms, losing their jobs - and during an age where there were no social safety networks (or not many other than the church or the poor house) losing your livelihood to a machine must have been horribly frightening.

I suspect the chasm was widened further during the Arts and Crafts movement when useful items that were made by hand were extolled as being superior to items made by industry. Something that may very well have been true during the early days of mechanization taking over from hand work.

But let's face it - we have all seen inferior work produced by hand as well as by machine, and quality work produced by hand and by machine. The fact that something is made by hand is no guarantee of quality. Unfortunately.

Since I chose weaving as a career, I have from the get go been concerned with working efficiently, both in my actual hand movements and in the choice of tools that I have purchased. To my mind buying a loom with a dobby, cloth advance and fly shuttle just made all sorts of economical sense. Without my AVL dobby loom, I could not have been as productive as I have been over the years.

But the loom does absolutely nothing on its own. It is a hand loom and always will be so long as I own it.

The Canadian government (in its wisdom) came up with a legal definition for 'hand woven'. To paraphrase - each and every action of the loom must be initiated by the weaver.

In other words, I cannot flip a switch and walk away "to have a cup of tea" as one person put it recently. No weaver, no weaving going on.

I'm tired of having people who don't understand how a dobby loom (computer aided or mechanical) works, have never seen a fly shuttle let alone used one, or come to the realization that an auto-cloth advance does not take control away from the weaver, point their finger at me and cry "not a hand weaver".

I disliked it 30 years ago, and I dislike it now. But I remind myself that these crys of 'impostor'
are being made out of ignorance. These people simply don't know and don't understand that the addition of mechanical assistance takes nothing away from the weaver. In fact, the weaver actually has to know a lot more because they need to know how to operate the equipment, and when something goes wrong, how to fix it. They need to know how to adjust it so that they get the results they want, just like they need to know how to adjust their technique when weaving on a loom without all this mechanical assistance.

Many people don't realize that I have more than one loom. One is the AVL equipped with computer assist, 4 box fly shuttle, auto-cloth advance etc. But my other loom is a 4 shaft Fanny counter balanced loom.

I love both of these looms - the AVL for it's complexity that allows me to efficiently weave very complex designs - the Fanny for it's very simplicity.

Today when I'm still feeling so sick, my tool of choice is not the AVL - I need way too much mental acuity to weave successfully on that loom. My tool of choice today is the Fanny.

And I will always consider myself a hand weaver, regardless of which loom I am weaving on.

More Missouri Memories

Mary sent a picture of the group that were in the workshop in LaMar, Missouri. Great folks, great food, great time weaving. The weather even co-operated, cooling down from over 100 to low 80's. Who could ask for anything more? :)

Missouri Memories

Sorry about the focus on this photo - it was really hard to get a clear picture as the book has a foil wrapper and the camera really didn't know how to get a clear picture I guess. Either that or it's because I've got a cold and my eyes don't want to focus, either. :(

One of my favourite authors is Jim Butcher. He writes two series (well, perhaps he writes more, but two of his series are getting regularly published) and both of them are great. Quite often I'll like one series an author writes but not the others. The other exception to this is C. J. Cherryh, but that's another book review.

Anyway, after travelling to Missouri for the weekend (way too many adventures getting there, but I did arrive!) I was heading home Monday after enjoying great hospitality and wonderful people. I'd brought a couple of paperbacks with me, but wasn't really enjoying the second one and not looking forward to nearly 10 hours of travel and a book that wasn't engaging my interest.

So, I wandered through a couple of the book stores after I got through security and spied the brand new title from Jim Butcher - a book that I had on request from the library.

Now I don't usually invest in hardbacks when I'm travelling - they weigh too much to drag around in my carry on luggage. But - it was the most recent Jim Butcher. And I really wasn't enjoying the book I was currently reading.

I think I resisted the urge for about - oh, 10 seconds? - and bought it.

I sort of remembered that Butcher was from the US 'south' and flipped to the back flap. Yup. He's from Independence, Missouri. :D Seemed all the more appropriate that the souvenir I chose to return with was a book written in Missouri!

Butcher writes with wit and not a little sarcasm. The Dresden series is a combination of hard PI and inventive supernatural fantasy. But it is always laced with penetrating insights about the human condition. This morning as I was nearly finished reading the book, one of the characters says to Harry Dresden "Stop learning, start dying."

How appropriate.

Missouri

All packed ready to head home. Great group. Several baby weavers as one referred to herself. :)

Great to see them coming to the warped world!

Sent from my BlackBerry device on the Rogers Wireless Network