June 2017 – Backstrap Loom Weaving

Backstrap Weaving – A Job Worth Doing….

I wonder if you recognize this….

If you don’t, it’s because the last time I showed you this warp, it looked like this…

I had put this warp together very quickly so that I could be filmed weaving it for a documentary that friends Marilyn and Rainer are making. Marilyn offered me yarn from her stash and, between other weaving activities with a group of backstrap weaving friends, I quickly chose colors, wound the warp and wove off as much as I could before filming.

It’s 10/2 perle cotton with embroidery floss as supplementary weft. There wasn’t time to sample which broke my Golden Rule and, for that reason, the weaving gradually widens as it goes along. I hadn’t discovered through sampling the ”sweet spot”…that is, the width at which this particular number of ends in this 10/2 cotton wanted to settle.

I didn’t weave a sample when I used this Harrisville Shetland wool as I was in a hurry to get this band made. Nevertheless, I managed to hit that sweet spot straight away….just got lucky that time!

Once I have found that sweet spot, I never have to worry about the weaving width again. The width will stay consistent without constantly having to measure and control it. It is a lovely place to be. I let the yarn tell me where it wants to be.

Another clue to the fact that the warp ends were pushed too close together at the start was the fact that I had to beat extra hard – too hard – to get the picks per inch that I needed to make the supplementary weft pattern look right. By looking ”right”, I mean that the shapes have a nice solid look rather than having gaps between the weft floats from one pick to the next (although, having gaps between the picks is a certain effect that works well in some cases. It’s a matter of personal preference).

Once I got home and finished my big silk project, I decided I really needed to finish Marilyn’s cotton piece before venturing into something new. I pushed all the new ideas that I have competing for space in my head to back and pulled out the warp with its lovely pinks and purples.

However, I found that I just couldn’t face it with its width difference. Even the fell was beginning to slope as it seems that the warp ends were pushed closer together on one side than the other.

I took a deep breath and un-wove it so that I could start over with my new measurements in mind. Boy, did that feel good! So, the piece with the leaf pattern turned out to be the sample that I should have made in the first place. You know the old adage…A job worth doing…..

Now it is rolling along nicely and quite effortlessly. I am using motifs that I created for my silk piece and it is weird weaving them in this much thicker yarn. The cotton is so much more forgiving. I found when using the 60/2 silk that if I pulled too hard on any one warp end as I was doing the pick-up, the end would magically lengthen and not want to go back into place! Of course, it’s much easier to work with, let alone see, these strands of 10/2 cotton!

While I work on this piece I am planning my next silk one. I have a nice collection of colors in 120/2 silk that I would like to somehow combine in one piece….lots of lovely berry tones with some golds.

There you can see the black silk wrap that I recently finished rolled up in plastic ready to be taken to Canada. It will be in one of the Exhibits at ANWG this year. Quite a few of my backstrap weaving buddies will be there and I am looking forward to seeing Tracy and Yonat again and meeting Kristin, who also recently finished a silk weaving on her backstrap loom using a Japanese reed and her own handspun and naturally dyed thread. She has labeled this piece ”naturally dyed striped silk tsumugi” and it is stunning. She will be bringing it to ANWG where I will get to see and touch it.

I love how the colors in this post are going so well together! Here’s another finished backstrap loom project from weaving friend Wendy. She wove a hatband for her fisherman husband’s hat…

Marilyn and the backstrap weaving group in the northwest got together to encourage each other and weave some bands…

I love how these backstrap weaving study groups are sprouting up! Marilyn has a nice wooden post which she calls the ”village tree”around which the weavers gather.

I met Cindy at ANWG 2013 and do hope that she will be able to come to ANWG this year too. This is something she has been working on recently…a nice Andean Pebble Weave pattern from my second book. I love her arrangement of stripes in the borders.

Rosemary sent me this picture of the lovely backstrap weaving set-up that she has in her yard. She told me that she refers to my second book there alongside on her tablet. I love that my book sits there in excellent company with the Cahlander and Cason classic publication.

Jean, who recently got back from Guatemala where she had weaving lessons, sent me this picture of a prepared warp that she bought to take back to the USA. She knows that I like to use bicycle and umbrella spokes and other bits of wire and needles to secure my warps to the beams and she was tickled to see some Guatemalan weavers using such things in their warps as well. It seems that the spoke is tied in place to stop the warp ends from falling off the beam while Jean packs and transports the loom. I am looking forward to seeing what she weaves with this lovely cotton warp. I believe the cotton has been dyed with plants.

Dorinda, who works with the weavers in Cochabamba, is back after her visit to the USA. I had been hoping to travel to the highlands this month for a quick visit with her and Maxima and the young ladies who were having their first weaving lessons back in January but I just couldn’t find the time. I will have to leave that for the end of the year. One of the young ladies, 11-year old Nelva, has been weaving and also drawing and Dorinda sent me this picture she has drawn based on a photo of some of the Huancarani ladies strolling and spinning yarn. I guess the lady on the back of the card is collecting dye plants.

Dorinda keeps them all busy with various art and craft projects. She always arrives from the USA with new craft supplies and ideas for activities.

To finish, I will leave you with the good news that the second volume of Rodrick Owen and Terry Newhouse Flynn’s work on Andean sling braids is coming out this November. I am excited that the sling pictured at left that I made with my teacher in Peru back in 1997, makes an appearance. I made this one with the braid pattern that my teacher called the ‘‘palma’‘. After finishing my sling, he taught me another pattern called ”margarita”.

This new book teaches 50 beautiful patterns as well as how to create and embellish an entire sling.

Here is the blurb from the Schiffer catalog…

Sling Braiding Traditions and Techniques: From Peru, Bolivia, and Around the World

Rodrick Owen & Terry Newhouse Flynn

Available November 2017 $39.99

This comprehensive, full-color guide features dozens of images of slings from various cultures, both ancient and contemporary. Slings had great significance in many cultures, particularly in the Andes, and were often used as both prehistoric weapons and herding tools. The book shows novice and experienced braiders how to make 50 designs, from 8 to 32 strands, on a braiding card or with a braiding stand and bobbins. Learn step by step how to make an authentic Andean-style sling with braided cords and a tapestry-woven cradle. A range of techniques useful for beginning, ending, and embellishing slings are included, and can enhance a wide variety of other items, like jewelry, garments, and accessories. This book is a key resource for historians, ethnologists, textile artists, weapons experts, and others to learn the practical skills for understanding sling braids’ structure. Includes braiding card and plans to make core stand.

Size: 8 1/2″ x 11″ | 457 color photos, charts/drawings, and weaving diagrams | 176 pp
ISBN13: 9780764354304 | Binding: hard cover

Backstrap Weaving – Simply Silk

All I can talk about this week is that I finished THE silk piece…hooray, hooray! and that I learned more about ”hard” pressing.

I started this long project last (Bolivian) summer having brought back lots of lovely 60/2 silk from my trip away. I got home energized after having just filmed my Operating a Backstrap Loom dvd. I then filmed my Basic Warping for Backstrap Looms video in Bolivia, wove a wool band as a warm-up project (I had been away from any real weaving on my loom for about 2 months) and proceeded to launch myself into what I knew would be a long project both in terms of physical length and time.

I knew that I wanted to do some three-color pebble weave with all three colors interacting on both faces of the cloth at the same time but I also knew that it would take far too long to finish if I used that kind of structure along the whole length of the piece. So, I limited this more complex structure to just the very start of the piece. Of course, I knew that I would need to repeat it at the very end…..but that was months away!

After that initial band of three colors, I wove the rest using the same three-color pebble weave but with only two colors interacting on each face at any one time…gold and brown on one face and red and brown on the other. It is still quite time-consuming weaving this way but less so than having all three colors on both faces at the same time. The pattern theme for the piece is ”interlocking diamonds” and I enjoyed creating motifs in both pebble weave and supplementary-weft inlay to suit the theme.

The main motif in the three-color section is charted in my second book….More Adventures with Warp-faced Pick-up Patterns. Some of the other motifs in two colors are also in that book while I invented others just for this piece.

One of the best parts, as always, is feeling and seeing the transformation in the wet-finishing process. I have wet-finished a couple of 60/2 silk pieces before and was really excited to see how the silk cloth relaxed and shone as the iron lifted the moisture away. However, I was aware that the finished cloth wasn’t quite as stable as I had hoped it to be. So, I asked my online weaving contacts for suggestions and was lucky to get replies from those who have had a lot of experience working with silk and with wet-finishing in particular. Laura Fry has written a book called ”Magic in the Water” which is on the wet-finishing process and how it affects different structures and fiber.

This piece finished up with beautiful sheen but not quite as stable as I had hoped.

I learned that I should probably be a bit more vigorous in the washing part of the process…not the nervous, gentle hand-washing that I usually do. I used warm water this time instead of cool. But, one of the most important changes to be made was in the ”hard” press.

I always iron on the floor as I don’t have a board….not that I do much ironing. It is mostly about my finished woven pieces rather than clothes. Now, this is a good thing when it comes to hard pressing as I recall having read stories of people having broken their ironing boards while trying to give their cloth a good hard press. Terry told us that the combination of heat, pressure and hard surface were ”perfect for imparting smoothness to a fibrous surface”. This, we were told, also applies to the paper-making process where it is called ”calendering”. Laura had said that compressing the threads is really important as a flatter surface reflects more light.

Okay. So, how hard is ”hard”? Who knows… but when I am given instructions like this, I usually take them to extremes to the best of my physical ability. It reminds me of the time my weaving teacher in Peru told me to pull the weft really tight when weaving tubular bands. I sliced up my hand with the weft thread as I had it wrapped about my hand in order to pull it really hard.My bandaid-covered digits in the picture above show the result of having been told to grip the llama bone hard and beat firmly. With my teacher hovering and constantly reminding me to beat hard, I turned out cloth that was incredibly firm…a characteristic that is much admired by highland weavers. I was possibly gripping and beating too hard…hence the torn up hand…but I was pleased with the compliments I got from the weavers.

As for the hard pressing, I placed a thin towel on my ceramic tile floor and put as much body weight as I could manage onto the iron. It was almost like doing push-ups with only my toes remaining in contact with the floor! Sara had reminded me that the cloth should still be damp when pressing or else wrinkles will be permanent. It was quite a work-out!

Anyway, I got a nice shiny polished surface and I am happy with how the web has transformed into stable cloth. Now it surprises me to see how lifeless the piece looked while it was still on the loom.

I’ll be pressing that teal bandanna again…hard… to see the difference that makes.

What’s next? More silk, I think, but on a much smaller scale. Perhaps I’ll make some silk bands for my new hat in three-color pebble weave. I’d also like to start another wool conference neck pouch like this one…

…but with a different patterning structure and a different style of tubular band. And then, there’s jewelry…three-color pebble weave wrist cuffs and neck ribbons for various pendants I have been picking up along the way. There’s always something to keep me busy at the loom!

To finish, let me show you an old photo I recently uncovered while tidying . This was taken back in 1996 before I came a backstrap weaver. It is possibly my first ever encounter with a backstrap weaver and this took place in the plaza of Cusco, Peru. I asked the weaver if she would weave for me and promised to buy the little loom I have in my hands if she would. She was more than happy to do so. A few weeks later, I met a weaver from Ayacucho who was able to teach me.