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This article walks you through designing and creating your own personalized set of placemats using name drafting, doubleweave, and integrated plain weave in Fiberworks PCW.
This article presents considerations and lessons learned for creating your own perfect table mats based on their intended use.
Weave a set of table linens in crackle, one of the most useful and versatile weave structures: crackle is a block weave based in three-shaft twill that lets you weave big blocks of color without sacrificing structural stability.
Worried about finding the perfect finish for your piece? This article will help you choose based on the item’s intended use, the yarn, the weaving pattern, and how it will be laundered.
What is damask and how can weavers add it to their repertoire? This article walks through how damask is created using a drawloom.
Learn how to weave a single twelve-block damask table mat in four-end broken twill.
A twill scarf like a hug using a handpainted warp on 8- or 12-shafts
Justin explains and teaches how to warp with multiple ends using historical method that he says may be tricky to pick up and can seem overwhelming at first. You might try it and want to go right back to winding with one end at a time. Learning a new skill can be hard, but once it clicks, you’ll save time and wear and tear on your body and join centuries of weavers from around the globe.
Justin, like pretty much every handweaver in the US today, was taught to insert packing between layers of warp, and he dutifully obeyed for hist first eighteen years of weaving. But as a studen of history and weaving, he’s found no mention of historical packing but instead a common technique for beaming a warp that doesn’t require any.
A step-by-step guide to warping back to front (just like Jane)
What is the best way to warp a loom? That’s an awesome question with many possible answers. We all learn to warp a loom from our very first weaving teacher, whether that be an in-person instructor, a book, or someone on the World Wide Web. Sometimes those experiences are great, and other times they leave us totally overwhelmed and in need of a stiff drink. Jane talks us through many many ways to warp a loom and encourages us all to find the way that works for us.
Yes, a warp can live forever and Madelyn shows you how in this step-by-step guide to tieing on a new warp to your old warp. Need a new threading? She cheekily suggests that you get a new loom.
This is a common instruction in many weaving projects and patterns, and one we often follow blindly. After all, if the instructions say so, there must be a reason to do so, right? Well, let’s talk a bit about floating selvedges, what they are, their advantages and disadvantages, and when they should and shouldn’t be added.
Threading a loom is one of the most exacting steps in the weaving process. It requires focus, patience, and a keen eye for detail. We all know scoring that trifecta isn’t always possible! This article covers identifying and fixing threading errors along with best practices to avoid them!
This stunning project uses supplemental warps but more than that, Deb explains her simple and fool-proof system for using a supplemental warp. She talks about when and how to weight it, how to know if you’re using too much or too little weight, how to winde and beam the warp, and how to thread (sitting at the front or the back). She gives basic rules and troubleshoots the process and finally, you get to weave a gorgeous turned monk’s belt pillow.
Hand painting your own warps gives you an incredible amount of freedom and flexibility. It gives you an opportunity to infuse your own creativity and flair into every piece you weave in a way that is unique to you. You can dive deep into your own style, which will develop and grow the more you do it. No two pieces will ever be identical. Here’s an easy to follow guide to painting your first warp!
Sleying errors are some of the most demoralizing things that can go wrong while dressing a loom. As you’re weaving your header, finally getting ready to start your project after all the work of warping, beaming, and threading, you notice ends sleyed in the wrong order, or the wrong number in a dent. Now instead of throwing a shuttle, you have to stop, sigh deeply, and dig your sley hook back out. Luckily, sleying errors are often easy to fix. Here’s how to move past them to the weaving part of weaving as painlessly as possible. This article covers identifying and fixing sleying order errors denting errors, and missed threads.
At the heart of weaving is the art and science of mastering even warp tension. Identifying and addressing warp tension problems early on in your project is key to achieving your weaving goals. Here, we’ll explore common signs of tension trouble, causes of tension trouble, and practical solutions to help you get your weaving back on track.
Have you ever considered how the heddles on your loom affect your weaving? Often as new weavers we get a loom and are simply happy to use whatever came with it. However, the type of heddle on your loom can make both the threading process and your weaving either pleasant and simple, or difficult and frustrating. It’s important to have heddles that are suited to your loom, your materials, and you. This article covers: heddle types, which heddles work on which looms, managing your heddles, adding heddles, and division and balance.
Weaving temples are instantly recognizable tools valued by weavers throughout history and across cultures. Old as the hills and infinite in variety, temples have been immortalized in the medieval stained glass of Chartres Cathedral and Van Gogh’s paintings of Nuenen weavers at work in the 1880s. These days, new temples can be purchased easily online so that devotees might have in their collection one of every possible size, while avid connoisseurs scour antique shops and old barns for vintage examples. Wondering what all the fuss is about? This article discusses what a temple does, how (and when) to use it (step-by-step), and what to do if your temple causes distress!
Do you ever avoid projects with lots of stripes because of all the color changes? Have you ever missed or miscounted a stripe – or, worse yet, run out of yarn before finishing a warp – making your warp unintentionally asymmetrical? Do you want to speed up the process of winding a warp in the first place? If you answered yes to any of the above, then folded warps are for you!
The shifting ratios of gradient warps make for stunning results, but the amount of effort required to wind them can be prohibitive, not to mention prone to error. The good news is that symmetrical gradients are ideal candidates for folded warps: you’ll save half the effort of all those color changes, plus the gradient will be symmetrical even if you miscount the number of ends in a stripe or get – ahem! – creative with the blending ratios. This stunning project will walk you through creating a folded warp (f2b or b2f) and you’ll create a gorgeous gradient towl.
Susans prefers warping back to front with a raddle, and she’s tried loads of methods to help her wind on warps over the years. Some worked OK, some not so great, and some were just messy (like using water bottles). Nearly everything she tried had issues that appeared while weaving – broken threads, tangles, uneven warp tension. Her current favorite is easy to use and produces perfect results consistently: athletic weights, attached after the warp ends are through the raddle. This article explains exactly how to use this method and why it works so well!
If we are going to weave on a table or floor loom, we need some way of measuring the warp threads so they are all the same length, under tension or not. The most common options are warping boards and warping mills. Let’s delve into what they are, their advantages and disadvantages, and which one is perfect for you.