Monday, July 22, 2019

Finishing the Tussah Silk Scarves

The two silk scarves that where inspired by one of the succulents in my garden are off the loom, washed and dried.  Now they are ready to have the fringes twisted; for the silver scarf I choose to do the twizzling in small bouts, for a more delicate appearance.
Next step is to iron the scarves.  I had quite the ironing pile to go through; there is a tablecloth, a table runner, four tea towels and what seems to be a lot of scarves.  And yes that pink scarf is really long!  It turns out that 3/1 twill doesn’t have a lot of take up; the warp was originally 100 inches but after weaving it to what Mom thought was around 70 inches, and then washing the final length of the scarf is 82 ½ inches long!
I am always surprised by the change that a hard press makes on a scarf.  It not only flattens the scarf but brings out the sheen and allows the pattern to leap forward.
The weft that I used for the rosette scarf was a lovely rosy brown but when I washed the scarf the weft ran and a lot of the red came out of the scarf but it left behind a gorgeous copper colour weft with a lot of shine.  The scarf is still lovely, just a little different from how I thought it would turn out.

The silver weft that I used for the second scarf really muted the plum and moss of the warp.  It looks totally different from the copper scarf.

Final garden shot is Crocosmia ‘Lucifer’ and you can see a hummingbird hidden on both photos, that has staked out the patch.  The hummingbirds love this plant; they sit on the branches all day fighting off other hummingbirds, bees and seem to get particularly stroppy with the bumble bees!

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