One More Please

This year I wanted to finish up all the loose ends so I could start the new year fresh, with new weaves.  I took some time from weaving to do photography and computer work to list the last of the scarves from last year.  The collapse weave Merino wool scarves in lavender and fawn are now listed.

I also got a new computer as my old computer is over 10 years old and it is starting to have difficulties staying connected to the internet, so lots to learn there.  As I was transferring over files to the new computer, I noticed that we haven’t had any black table runners in the shop for a while.  I found a new draft to try and picked out some 5/2 cotton in black and beige and that is as far as I got in the planning.

Because as soon as pulled the colours and plan together; I accepted a commission for a shawl, so I dropped everything to focus on the shawl.  This isn’t the first time that I’ve been asked to reweave this shawl, it seems that every time that I sell one, the next day someone asks if I can make one for them too!

On day 1: I pulled the black 2/8 Tencel warp, I have put on enough warp for two shawls.  I did a rough sley of the warp using the built in raddle on top of the castle of the Louet Spring loom and then pulled the warp onto the back beam, ready for threading tomorrow.

Day 2: I removed the breast beam and the beater bar, from the loom, to make it easier to reach the heddles.  This cleared the front of the loom so I was able to place a chair into the loom to get even closer to the shafts.  It is always good to get close and have a comfortable reach to the threads; especially when the threads are black and on a foggy and grey Vancouver Island winter day.  Before replacing the breast beam and beater bar, I like to tie up the treadles, it is easier when you don’t have to watch your head banging on the web.

Day 3:  I put the breast beam and the beater bar back onto the loom and sleyed the reed.  I was then able to tie on the warp to the cloth beam.  I hem stitched the warp and wove the first pattern repeat to make sure that there wasn’t any mistakes.

Day 4 and I am now weaving away on the body of the shawl.  The weft colour is a lovely dark raspberry red 2/8 Tencel, a different colour from the original shawl but truly lovely.

Final Garden Photo is one of the groups of King Alfred Daffodils just starting to pop up with some Drumstick Alliums amongst them.  We did a lasagna style planting (layering bulbs in the same spot) and so far so good.  On the left side there is a deer foot print, she just missed stepping on one of the bulbs!

Ten Shaft Tea Towels

January is the time of the year when I want to weave tea towels.  There is something so very comforting about putting on a warp and weaving for the home. 

Tea towels are a relatively straightforward weave and after all these years I know how to work with 2/8 un-mercerized cotton.  Twenty-two to twenty-four inches is a width I’m comfortable with, and the generally simple treadling sequence allows me to make sure I’m concentrating on my posture and throwing technique.

This year I’ve decided to re-visit a pattern that I’ve done at least four times previously.  It is a 10 shaft modified overshot design that creates flowers in a bed of plain weave.

The first time I wove this pattern was in 2013 and I chose a Spring Palette.  I then wove it later or in 2013 as a Plaid in Red, Beige and Navy.  I actually wove it twice more and didn’t blog about it either time. 

The third time I wove them in red, white and blue and they were snapped up on Etsy.  The fourth time I wove it in a soft pastel plaid and gave them away to friends without ever taking a photo.

This time I am choosing to weave this wonderful pattern with white warp and strong clear colours.  I have 7 yards on the loom and I plan on weaving six different colours.  Blue, Lavender (if there is enough on these pirns), red/violet, rose, blue/green and ink blue.

I get a huge amount of pleasure just looking at a beautifully dressed loom!

The first colour is a lovely clear, sweet blue from M. Brassard et fils in Quebec, simply called Bleu.

I have only begun this project and the only real change I have made to the pattern is that I have threaded the selvedges as basket weave.  Hopefully, it will make a pretty edge line.

I have two photos today from the garden.  Yesterday we had ‘mizzle’ (misty drizzle), so I popped my Meyer Lemon outside for a drink.  The plant seemed to love getting outside for the first time in months.

While I was taking the photo of the lemon, I caught this wee hummingbird silhouetted against our grey sky.

Itten's Star ~ A Colour Wheel

Colour choices can make or break a woven article, with the right colour choices ~  magic!   Poor colour choices can draw the colour down making it lacklustre and essentially muddying the colours.

The Colour Star by Johannes Itten can be a very useful tool to help you make magic by showing you what colours work together and which colour combinations make each colour shine in its own right. 

 The Colour Star comes in a fold over box which contains; an written overview of the stars  premise which is based on geometry, the star itself and nine black discs to isolate the colours and create what Itten calls chords.  Based on triangles, squares and rectangles, the Itten Star challenges our colour perceptions.  I have set out some cones of tencel as examples, please bear in mind that these colours are not necessarily ideal as they may not have the same colour saturation levels and are for demonstration only.

The first disc has two openings which isolate ‘the complementary’.  The complement of one colour on the wheel is the colour which lies directly opposite it on the colour wheel.  My example shows orange and blue.

Next is a Triadic chord. This disc outlines an equilateral triangle; these colours will work well together harmoniously.  My example shows violet, green and orange.

Another Triadic chord is the Split Complementary and this is the one I use most often when planning ‘Echo Weave’.  A split complement is made up of three colours, one basic and two colours which lie either side of its complement.  This colour combination almost always creates iridescence. My example shows  green, yellow and red/violet.  Red/violet is the base colour and green and yellow lie on each side of it's complement yellow/green (lime).

Next is a Quadratic chord, called the Tetrad which is based on two pairs of opposite colours.  The first opposites are yellow and violet, the second set is orange and blue/green. 

The second Quadratic chord shows a Tetrad of two complementary colour pairs based on a square. My example shows yellow/green, orange, red/violet and blue.  Red/violet is opposite yellow/green and orange is opposite blue.

The final Quadratic chord was actually missing from my Itten Star, so I borrowed the disc from a friend and made a copy.  The four colours in the Tetrad are the four colours of a rectangle on the wheel.  My example shows blue, yellow, orange and violet.  

Now we are onto a Five Tone chord.  This disc shows a primary colour with its four split complements.  My example shows violet and blue/violet, orange, blue/green and green.

This next disc has six openings, but it still falls into the Triadic category.  This Triadic chord uses colours on opposite sides of the true Triad.  My example is green, yellow/green, orange, orange/red, violet and blue/violet.

The final Dyadic disc is called a Six Tone chord.  This is a hexagon which incorporates 3 commentaries. I can’t quite wrap my head around this one as it just seems to be most colours put together.  My example is yellow, orange, red, violet, blue and green.  

The Colour Star can be helpful to narrow down colours which will work well together.  The the ratio of how the colours are put together is a whole other story (and perhaps another blog post)!  I recall hearing one weaver say that if she uses blue in a warp she always puts a tiny hint of orange too, it just made the blue, bluer.  Funnily enough, she also stated that her least favourite colour was orange, but her stash featured heaps of orange!

My final shot is a lovely batch of strawberry/rhubarb jam we made this week to fill the house with memories of summer.

A New Year and a New Start

It is a tradition on this blog to share what is on the looms at the beginning of the year.  This year they are both empty!

But there is weaving related things going on, there was a brief moment of winter sun so I tried to do some photos of the lavender collapse weave wool scarf for the Etsy store, WovenBeauty.  I’m trying a coloured background to see if I can get the pale colour of the scarf to show correctly.

There is also a photo shoot for a blog post going on in the kitchen with tubs of colourful Tencel.  

We have been knee deep in snow for what feels like weeks but yesterday the weather changed and the snow started to quickly melt away.  There are some hidden treasures waiting in the garden.  A lovely pansy blooming is a welcome reminder that spring in coming.

On Vancouver Island there are Anna’s Hummingbirds who stay the winter and we have 3 in the back garden staking out the bird feeder.  

This year they got a Christmas present of a hummingbird feeder heater!  It was quite the hit during the cold snap that we just had.