-
Let us know: What topics would you like to see covered in the Academy?
Janet and I are working on the class release schedule for Learning Path 2. We’d like to include some classes that are not related to the Learning Path, possibly by other instructors.
So we’d like to know: What classes or topics would YOU like to see in the Academy?
Let us know – it will help us in our planning.
-
111 Replies
-
I would like to understand weave structures better. What makes crackle crackle, why is it called summer and winter, or Bronson lace, etc. How can look at a draft and tell what the structure is? I hear people say you can weave that as x, but how do they know that? This topic is a mystery to me and I’d love to learn more.
-
Thanks Barb, I have those questions as well.
-
Thanks Barb! I have the same questions too! I am also interested in deflected double weave and collapse weave structures as well as many more!
-
-
This would be a good thing.
-
Yes, I need the same thing. Also, I’m wondering if we can have a separate class on designing with each weave structure (e.g., designing with plain weave, or designing with crackle) and then a class on the specific tips, tricks or problems that may crop up with any give design structure.
-
Piping in with my support for this one too.
-
Wheeeee! This is my favorite stuff to talk, write, and teach about! :D :D :D
-
This is a great suggestion!
Margaret
-
Add me to the list of interested people here on this topic.
-
-
I am very interested in all things weaving. Krokbragd, Saori, and Navajo weaving are very interesting to me. I do think I saw somewhere Krokbragd is coming soon.? There is too much to choose from. Currently, my reading is on Shadow weave. Janet explored it just enough in her departure’s class to make me want to learn more. I was able to locate Marian Powell’s 1000 (+) Patterns now to learn to read the drafts. There is not really anything that would not interest me.
So far I have been learning some pretty basic stuff that may have been in some of the classes I have already done but has been expanded on. Many of you have been weaving way longer than I and know how to fix things. I just stand back and look at the back of my loom with 12 threads hanging off the back wondering why they broke or were missing??? And how to fix it so it doesn’t happen again. It’s kinda like the use of a fish line as a floating salvage. Which I finally got a chance to read and found very informative. Thank you. My last warp took me several tries to get it in the reed, (without missing a slot) Then when it came to the threading OH BOY! I ended up with threads crossed, backwards, missing, broken, took me 3 days to warp. I cried the hardest over this warp. But did not give up, my towels are not perfect but they are waffle weave you will not see the mistakes. I hope. to much
I know a lot of things are practice, and patience both of which I need more of.
So whatever you throw at me I can take it. Bring it on.
-
I would like some basic methods of sewing handwoven cloth with a view to being able to make clothes. Even if we made a bag (for example) and added a pocket or a zipper to help incorporate that technique if we wanted to sew clothes.
There are only so many scarves and hand towels you can weave.
-
This is a great idea – I would be interested in that as well.
-
Dayamitra, This is sort of off topic, this is something to do with all those towels. I found a very cool video on how to make a bag using two to three tea/dish towels. It is so ingenious; The 3 Tea Towel (Dish Towel) Tote Bag Tutorial – Easy Beginner Bag Bing Videos I use just two towels and commercial woven webbing for the handles. My poor old sewing machine has been getting a workout since I started weaving.
bing.com
how to make a bag using two dish towels - Search Videos
how to make a bag using two dish towels - Search Videos
-
-
I would like to learn more about the different types of twill weaves so when people refer to point twill, advancing twill, undulating twill, turned twill etc I know what they are talking about. I’m not even sure just how many types of twill there are. How do they differ? Why use one rather than another – is there a practical reason or is it all aesthetics?
As well as the different types, how does designing with a twill weave differ from designing with plain weave? How can different twill weaves be used together in a design? When thinking of the finished use for a piece of weaving, is there any advantage to using twill rather than plain weave?
Mind you, I also want to learn about Overshot, Summer & Winter, Shadow, Crackle, Doubleweave, repp and just about every other weave structure there is as well so I think I will be happy with just about any weaving topic.
-
Yeah, I need to learn more about the different types of twill as well.
-
-
You are covering sooooo much. Thank you for all of this. I know dyeing isn’t exactly where you would want to go but when I am designing, I would love to learn some easy techniques to produce the design I would love to accomplish. I often hear people say, ” I couldn’t find the color combination so I dyed the yarn. “
Also, I have been fascinated with iridescence but I do not know how to achieve it on the rigid heddle. I would love an iridescence class. (I have read Bobbi’s book but didn’t understand a word of it! Orrr how to apply it to rigid heddle.
Thanks
-
A course on iridescence would be great! I would also be interested too.
-
I have done lots of dyeing, but mostly in a haphazard way to just see what I will get. I am about to launch into painted warps to create specific color effects. I could really use a blog post or something with some tips and techniques for painting/dyeing warps, particularly in how to manage a long warp for more than one item but with each one painted differently (without having a 20 yd long table :).
-
I agree…..it would also be great to know the best way to pick colors to use in a dyed warp. Is it the same 2 color rule?
-
I recently found a kit with brightly dyed wool ( merino) as the warp and a lovely med to dark gray alpaca(natural) for the weft. The pattern is a twill pattern fairly simple, but the picture was lovely. Last fall I purchased a hand dyed, merino/tencel It was really pretty and I picked a purple color plain color to match it. Then had a quick chat with Tien about using the variegated yarn as the warp and the plan color as the weft. She said it won’t work. These colors are so pretty it hard to see it as mud. But mud has been her experience with a hand dyed yarn intended for knitting. I have seen mud but they I have seen some that was not like the scarf kit I found. I liked the idea so well I bought 2 .
Sandy
-
Sandra…thank you for the the suggestion of videos! I will definitely watch them! LOL….love your dye method of throw in a pot and pray!????
-
-
-
-
-
Ok, just throwing out things I wonder about: double weave, shadow weave, crackle weave, using fibers other than cotton, using a hand dyed warp (NOT dyed while on the loom), purposeful pooling of color, using handspun yarn, using multicolored yarns (what structures are best), using art yarn, using Draft Editor or Fiberworks programs, felting handwoven fabric, making items with your woven cloth, troubleshooting common weaving issues…
-
I have seen lots of pooling dyed warps but most are cotton. Spoken with a couple of ladies who have dyed their cotton warps that looked amazing But I have a white wool warp that needs dye. The only thing I can think to do it to paint it outside in the sun on a really hot day and wrap it in plastic and leave it to bake in the sun, and then steam it after it’s been hanging out for a while. I have seen people get pretty creative in dying, so this is just wild enough it might work.
-
I’ve dyed wool, silk, mohair, and angora roving/handspun yarn for years, I bet you have dyed your angora from your rabbits? I would like to try to warp white yarn on the warping board, take it off and paint it with dye. Painting cotton in the past has not had the intense colors you get from wool. I have some dye that works with cotton that requires potash as a mordant, maybe that will make the colors more intense. I wonder how you get the dyed warp on the loom without it totally drifting??….
-
I have seen where they have dyed the warp right on the loom. One woman told me she paints her warp on the loom one said she lays it out on the floor, paints it, and lets it dry. Cotton doesn’t react to dye like wool. There is a dye company in Massachusetts, Pro Chem and they have tutorials on their website on how to do many types of dying and how to use their wide variety of dyes. I have done a fair amount of dying yarn, wool, and silk, I have not dyed alpaca or any angora. (take the back I did some angora /wool blend) I did some dying but not a lot. I tend to like natural colors and feel God gave all these critters the lovely natural array of colors why change it? My best dye jobs are those that have an unexpected outcome. Throw some wool in a pot drop some dye on top and pray. Usually works. lol.
-
-
I ‘paint’ wool warps. I fold them up in a shallow pan, soak them in shallow water and pour mixed dye in sections over the warp agitating each area just enough to have the dye disperse without over mixing, then bring to a simmer on a burner and add my acid. It’s not a technique were you have a ton of control, but the color blending is always fun and a surprise. If I want more control of my dye, I fold the warp and dip dye sections in a pot.
-
Carly, I would love to see photos of a finished piece. I’ve dyed wool yarn by laying it out on plastic wrap, painting the color segments, rolling it up in the plastic wrap, place in a pie tin over a steaming pot. Works great, but what happens with cotton and the warp drifting a bit during warping, ever done that?
-
These are left over from my last sale. Currently I select 2-3 colors- either 3 primaries that make a rainbow or two-three colors adjacent to each other that can blend (blue/green, Magenta/Purple/Red etc). The three primaries make different kinds of rainbows, the adjacent colors are more subtle. I then blend a color with all the dyes I used in my warp and use that to dye the weft and that seems to be working really well. The impact on some aren’t that striking, but some people like the muted pooling, the rainbow ones tend to sell the fastest.
-
Very Nice I need to get my nerve up thou.
-
Oh my goodness Carly, I love these, thank you for taking the time to post pictures. Do you ever end up with mud when you blend all your dyes together for the weft?
-
Carly! I love these? Did you paint the colors on? Did you dip! I want to do some with my tencel!!!!!???? Do you have a video showing the process you would recommend?
-
-
-
Carly, do these techniques work on tencel, cotton and silk as well? Are there certain color combinations that work well on the stove incase they mix? I think Tien also mentioned snow dyeing….I live in Mn. and that would be perfect.
-
Snow dying is really fun! Have you visited https://www.dharmatrading.com? They have so many good tutorials. I think you would really like dying! The snow technique works by slowing the chemical contact between the dye, water and soda ash so the dye is active and strikes the fibers at different times.
Did you ever do that chroma experiment as a kid where you take a marker and color a coffee filter, then let the coffee filter soak up water and the marker ink separates into different colors? That’s what happens if you have a dye mixed of different colors and you put it on top of snow over fiber.
Dying can be seem sciencey, but it’s also like cooking- you add a dash of this and a bit of of that. There’s a lot you can do with Tencel and bamboo and cotton because you don’ t need heat to set it, just time. Acid dyes for protein need some heat and acidity (like vinegar) to make it strike with the fiber.
-
Carly: My sister has been doing this incredibly gorgeous tie-dyed garment ice dyeing. That marker on the coffee filter is a perfect analogy to explain how it works. Thanks!! Now I want to do it on a warp :)
-
Thanks Carly! We just got 3 more inches of snow…I am going to do this in the next few weeks! LOL…..one of the art projects for my kids was to take a paper towel, fold it in 4ths then dip each corner into thin paint and watch it soak in and all the colors converge to make butterflies. Great visual…..now I just need to find the dyes and experiment! Thanks so much for the link!
-
-
-
-
-
-
I would also be interested in how to add finishing touches to my weaving. Hemstitching, fringes, hems, etc. Also, information about wet finishing and how that will change your finished cloth would be helpful.
-
I ‘m not a fan of plain weave, and would like to see more about gradients and other color changes in other weave structures (twills of all types, overshot, crackle, doubleweave, you name the structure). Most of the stuff I weave has one color in the warp. I put on long warps, so at some point I get bored and try color changes in the weft. However, I’d rather put color changes in the warp because I think that’s easier than changing colors in the weft.
-
I also like long warps (saves time and work if you do a load of an item rather than take it off to re-do). I love changing colours too as I can sometimes get a little bored. I love warp colours. I’d rather have one colour as weft as I find it easier.
-
One color in the weft is definitely easier! But it seems like every warp I do, I end up doing something with lots of color changes in the weft. I swear I’ll never do it again, but then I cut the piece off the loom and end up loving it. See the “what’s on your loom” for an example.
-
Ugh. Isn’t it a drag when all the time, energy, perseverance, and patience you put into fiddly weft colorwork pays off? ;)
I’m not being sarcastic, really I’m not! I expend most of my limited attention span for each project on the design and set-up, so I really WISH I could get the same fantastic results from one that’s really quick to weave. I mean, I DO get fantastic results, but I also know that they could be even more fantastic if I had the time, energy, perseverance, and patience to change colours frequently during the weaving stage.
-
-
-
-
I also would love to learn more about weaving with blocks–I love blocks!
-
I would love to find out how to add movement in to my weaving. For instance, if I wanted to weave waves to make it look as though they were moving, how could I do that? How could I achieve a ripple effect?
-
A big THANK YOU to everyone who’s replied so far! Keep the suggestions going – we want to hear them!!
-
I’d love to see a thorough discussion of savages and edge treatments. Not just the solutions to problems but creative threading for decorative salvages/edges
-
Hear Hear!
-
-
-
I really need to get better at FiberWorks so a class on that would be helpful. Working with silk. Handpainted warps (how to make them and choosing colors and when to use them). Maybe an occasional guest lecture or interview (via Zoom) of a highly skilled or creative weaver.
-
I would like be more educated in Fibreworks too. There are lots of buttons there that I’ve never tried because I don’t know what they do.
Fibreworks is handy because I know you can adjust the thickness of threads to see how a finer, or thicker, yarn will affect your draft. You can also have shaft counts as well, so you can count the heddles out before you begin threading. You can have colours counts as well. It’s so handy! There is lots more to know, however. I think we could do a whole course on it!
-
Bonnie Inouye has written supplement instructions for Fiberworks with some shortcuts and lots of good information. I think she will send it to you for $8. She also wrote Exploring Multishaft Design Which is out of print but she is in the process of updating it. She was helping from time to time a bunch of folks on Facebook with learning Fiberworks in a FB group. If anyone wants her email I have it you can get her book and the Fiberworks instructions.
-
-
-
Wow, I need a ‘like’ button to just move every one of these suggestions up in the list. I was thinking this weekend that demos or videos of doing cool things with Fiberworks would be nice. I know I am not using it to its potential. Everything about weave structures, twills, block weaves, etc as suggested above. So much from MYCS was valuable and I would be happy to refresh my memory about all of that. And yes, sewing tips for handwoven garments!! I fell in love with Liz Spear’s garments when I first saw them in her booth at a Convergence. I asked her if she would come to our guild and teach a class on garment construction using handwoven fabric. She had never done this, but she agreed and it was perhaps the best workshop I ever took. The garment I made was the best sewing I have ever done. And I purchased one of her jackets, which remains my favorite many years later :). Perhaps she would do a guest article with tips for this? It seems that Tien, you also have some amazing garment construction skills you could share! What about suggestions for patterns that work well with handwoven fabrics, or a forum for people to share their patterns and ideas?
-
You are so lucky to have Convergence! We don’t have anything like that here in Australia. Our Guilds here don’t do much in the way of learning how to sew clothes from our handwoven cloth either. I’m pretty much trying to pioneer my way. Most want to sew a rectangle to make a garment. That’s not what I want. I watch Daryl Lancaster YouTube videos, but there is more I need to know. I’d love to have a course where we could perhaps make a simple article of clothing from start to finish – step by step, with Q&A in between. There is no-one I can go to for help, so this kind of course really would be appreciated. I know Tien was trying to line something up for the future. I hope she can. Tjose of us that have nothing to help us would truly welcome it.
I’d also like some demo videos for Fibreworks. I use Fibreworks but there are so many buttons I still have no idea what they do. It’s such a handy programme.
-
-
An entire course on drafting would be awesome, including things like how to just ‘know’ how to change a tie-up to get the pattern one wants from a threading. I am guessing this is coming in the future of the HA, but posting it here just so it stays on the radar!
-
I think this would be interesting too. Our most recent course on drafting is sooo good!
-
I’m curious what you’re thinking about with this one, @joy-pate , and what it would cover that isn’t already on my gameplan for The Language of Weaving.
The last (planned?) installment* in The Language of Weaving is on drawdowns and drawups. I plan to cover how to create several different kinds of drawdowns and then how to use them. After that might come a class on analyzing a fabric and creating a draft for it, i.e. deriving the threading and treadling + tie-up or liftplan from a drawdown. At some point (probably during LP3) I’ll also start in on profile drafts.
What other topics should I make sure to cover? Can you expand on your question about tie-ups? There might be some small bite-sized questions I can answer via toolboxes sooner rather than later.
-
When I learned to weave, it was ‘learning by doing at the loom’. The instructor never taught drafting. So I simply followed patterns, until I got Fiberworks. Then, I just started changing threading or treadling to see what happens. I never touched the tie-up because it is like a black box of mystery to me. I guess I am ‘tie-up challenged’! Or was – theoretically, I understand what it is going on with the tie-up. I know that if I go from 1 and 3 to 2 and 4 on the first treadle, that shafts 2 and 4 will go up instead of 1 and 3 (on my jack loom – and thanks to you, now I know what jacks are!!). But it is not intuitive to me how to make changes to create a particular pattern effect in the drawdown. I see other weavers kind of ‘know’ how to change a tie-up, whereas for me, it is trial and error. It could just be that I need practice. So, perhaps some exercises where we are given a draft, then asked to change the tie-up to get a particular result? You may not be able to embed that, but a worksheet of things to try (people could use weaving software or even pencil and paper drawdown).
Perhaps another thing that would help is learning to identify weave structures by looking at the draft. Most of ‘you’ can glance at a draft and say ‘that is turned twill, or that is shadow weave, or ….’. If I studied these structures, I could probably do that too. So, a section on ‘what makes X structure that structure’ (and maybe a quiz so we apply ourselves rather than just read it!) would be really helpful.
And I think, that better understanding what makes a structure what it is, it may help us to have a better feel for how to change a draft, including the mysterious tie-up, to create the effect we want.
-
And I think the bottom line is, a beginners class on drafting may help lots of us who learned to weave by following patterns but never learned drafting theory, despite having been weaving for years. I remember a workshop I took once with Sharon Alderman. She sat down with me individually and started drawing out a draft, and showing me how one would develop the treadling to create the pattern in the cloth. It seemed so basic, but if you never learned it that way, it wasn’t for me. I remember wishing I could just take an entire workshop with her on drafting.
I hope this helps explain why I put this in the ‘wish list’ discussion. Perhaps someone else (I see that Dayamitra seconded it!) following the discussion will be able to chime in and be more specific about this. Thanks for asking Janet!!!!
-
OK, one more thought. The idea is: if I see fabric, or a painting, or a beautiful scene, where would I begin to create a draft that would look like that? From a blank slate, how can we interpret a visual experience into a draft? (by experience in this case I mean draft structure, not the mood and color experience we are learning about with Tien)
-
Fabulous! I can do a lot with this feedback! :)
For what it’s worth, several of your questions would (will!) be answered by the class I’ve already envisioned on analyzing a fabric and creating a draft. But not all, so now I know what to add and what to tweak. :D
-
I agree – I’m in the same boat having learned from existing patterns but not understanding the science behind it. I’d love to learn more!
-
-
-
-
I agree with all the suggestions because I want to learn it all!!! Ha! Not sure that is possible! I am very interested in double weave, clothing, and iridescence. Does the yarn, color, or the pattern create the iridescence?
Log in to reply.