Look It Up!

25 Tuesday Jun 2019

Posted by jeanweaves in creating, Designing

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“I don’t think that means what you think that means.”

Like Inigo Montoya, (“The Princess Bride”) I’ve found myself muttering that phrase lately. And it reminds me of my Mother’s answer whenever we asked what something meant—look it up!

We use a lot of words that are specific to our interests, but do they really mean what we think they mean? If we have to explain a term, can we do it without Google?

I’ve come across some design terms lately that I thought I knew – until I tried to define them. For example, what is the Golden Proportion?

What I learned when I looked it up (Mom would be so proud!) is that if you divide a line unequally into two sections, the ratio of the smaller section to the larger section should be the same as the ratio of the larger section to the whole. That’s the Golden Proportion (or Golden Section, or Golden Ratio). The same with a rectangle and any other shape or space. Our brains like the balance of that proportion.

Then there are design elements — line, shape, pattern, texture, color – and design principles — focal point, contrast, repetition, balance, movement, order.

These didn’t figure in my college courses, so at first glance, they seem sort of esoteric. (Did I use that word right?!) I mean, what exactly do designers mean by unity? Balance? Rhythm? Do I need to go to the deep end of the design pool?

Yes, I do.

In the weaving process, the hardest part for me sometimes is the designing. Why is that? Decision-making mostly, along with lack of confidence. I go back and forth about colors and placement, stripe sequences and where to put borders. It can take the better part of an afternoon to pull together a towel warp. If I can make these design principles a part of my planning, maybe the process will go more smoothly.

If I place a border on a towel using the Golden Ratio, I can trust that it will look good.

If I blend colors from one shade to another using a Fibonacci series — each number the sum of the two previous numbers (0, 1, 1, 2, 3, 5, 8, 13, and so on) – the transition will balance. In weaving, that could be the number of threads or the size of the stripe. Knowing how the system works should make designing less of a guessing game.

So now whenever I come across a design term that is a little vague to me, I will think of Mom and look it up. It will be worth it.

Weaver, Know Thyself

05 Tuesday Mar 2019

Posted by jeanweaves in Designing, Weaving Inspiration

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creative inspiration, Design, Weaving

One of my former weaving teachers, Madelyn Van der Hoogt, used to say there are two kinds of weavers: color/texture weavers and structure/pattern weavers.

The color/texture people are drawn to – well, color and texture. Their projects bump and bubble with shades and hues, delighting the eyes with a virtual flower garden on the loom.

The structure/pattern weavers gravitate towards those intricate interlacements that take the yarn in elaborate diamonds and laces. How do you get the strict grid on the loom to softly curve in the design?

Like all generalizations, these show opposite ends of the weaving spectrum. Most of us fall somewhere in between the extremes, but may drift toward one end or the other. At one point in a guild meeting, we were discussing this and a friend told me “Oh you’re definitely structure/pattern!”

Hmmm. I hadn’t thought of myself as being so far to that end. But as I scrolled through my weaving pictures, it’s obvious. While I do dabble in color blending and like a bit of texture in my towels, those fancy diamonds and stars show up over and over again.

The lemon napkins with a green twill border.

A similar pattern shows up in some red and blue towels.

There are the double weave placemats with repeating blocks and ovals.

And then there are the small table cloths sporting diamonds, stars, and blocks overall.

Weaver, know thyself.

Right now I have a towel warp on the small loom and my mind wanders while I’m throwing the shuttle. What can I put on the drawloom that will be more than an exercise in sampling? How can I adapt the elaborate fancy twills from the 18^th century Snavely manuscript into something delightful for the 21^st century? Is there room in our clear-the-clutter culture for decorative textiles?

So my mind wanders. I think a point twill on the 12-shaft loom is beginning to take shape.

Choosing Sides

20 Thursday Sep 2018

Posted by jeanweaves in Designing, Finishing

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Projects, Weaving

I stand at the ironing board, ready to press over the hem on the towel. I look more closely, flip the fabric over, flip it back. I pause, indecisive; which side is the “right” side?

Many weaves look distinctly different on one side from the other. Summer and Winter is a perfect example. One side is predominantly light and the other predominantly dark; that’s where it gets its name. Twills can have the same effect depending on the float lengths and colors of the warp and weft.

I weave a lot of twills and when the fabric is on the loom, I get used to the face on top. When the warp advances around the cloth beam to where I can see the other side, it’s can be a delightful surprise. Sometimes I can’t decide which side I like better. Do I want the accent motif to stand out on a uniform background, or is the background itself the star of the show?

As the weaver, it’s really up to me to choose which is the “right” side. Some weaves are pretty much the same on either side. Plain weave is – well, plain. Lace weaves will be opposite but still lace weaves—a weft float on the front will be a warp float on the back. It just depends on what you are looking for.

There comes a moment, though, when I have to decide—which is the front side and which is the back side. Hems have to go somewhere.

I pick up the iron, press, and pin. Decision made. At least until I sit down to sew the hem and have second thoughts.

Barn Raising

13 Friday Jul 2018

Posted by jeanweaves in Damask, Designing, Weaving Inspiration

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creative inspiration, Damask, family, Weaving

Framed Barn Picture You’ve heard the saying: “You can take the girl out of (insert your favorite place), but you can’t take the (insert your place again) out of the girl.” Cute and catchy. It explains all sorts of idiosyncrasies we aren’t even aware of, and some we wish we could outgrow, but no, they are part of our make-up.

For me, it’s my rural, upper Midwest upbringing. The way I pronounce certain words (much to my husband’s amusement); my love of cheese curds, brats, and beer; my preference for cool weather and all things “Norman Rockwell”-esque. You can take the girl out of Wisconsin…

I shared in Learning Experiences about this damask barn I was working on that would reflect both my Dad’s dairy farming and my Mom’s quilting. The challenge was getting the woven piece to show the same proportions as the graphed picture.

Five samples later, I took it off the loom, but then had to decide how to frame it. Another month went by before I found an answer in a box of my mother’s old pictures—a frame made by my grandfather. Its dark brown, rustic finish works, although I wish I had used a similar colored thread in the weaving. But then I didn’t know about the frame when I was weaving. Maybe next time.

It felt good and right to hang the barn above my loom, to step back and remember. I’m hoping they would approve.

Learning Experiences

04 Friday May 2018

Posted by jeanweaves in creating, Designing

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Creativity, Design, Weaving

We’ve all had them—challenges that derail the day, slow down the process, defy expectations. It’s the picture that turned out squashed. Or the warp that wasn’t quite long enough for that last towel. Or the blanket that came off the loom in a flourish only to reveal a treadling error in the middle.

Twill Gamp Blanket

As I was growing up, I heard more than once — much more than I wanted to hear — “Chalk it up as a learning experience.”

It’s a “glass half full vs. glass half empty” way of looking at things but without those learning experiences, we’d miss so many serendipities!

This spring I’m experimenting with some structures and experiments are all about seeing “what if…?” It’s a learning experience on purpose.

For the first time that I can remember, I actually wove a “gamp.” My dictionary defines gamp as a large baggy umbrella, used humorously. In weaving terms, a gamp is a sampler: thread 4 or 5 different threadings and colors, treadling as drawn in. It’s a fun way to try out different looks. My baby blankets sported 5 different colors in 5 different 8-shaft twill threadings and treadlings. Fun!

Except for that pesky treadling error right in the middle of the middle block! Learning experience. Perhaps that blanket will be cut up into bibs. Perhaps I’ll keep it as a twill reference.

On the drawloom, the barn picture went through several variations. The proportions of first one off the loom seemed off to me. Back to the digital “drawing board.”

I’ve read in Alice Schlein and Bhakti Ziek’s The Woven Pixel (2006 Bridgewater Press, available on Handweaving.net) that to get the woven picture to truly reflect the graphed design, you have to adjust the size of those little squares to the proportion of your weave structure. While their discussion was aimed at computerized weaving, I adapted their advice to my simple sketchpad drawing, making the squares – well, less square. After all, how many woven fabrics are perfectly balanced warp to weft?

After three or four more tries, I’m closer to the proportions I envisioned. And along the way, I played with different elements in the actual design. Slight differences, but all adding to the whole.

Barn in Progress

I’m learning to slow down on my assessments. So what if I ran out of warp for a towel? Can it still be woven up into something else—a napkin? A table mat? A wash cloth? It’s a fallacy to expect a project to turn out perfect on the first try.

I share this because I don’t think I’m alone here. As makers, we have this ideal we aim for and if it doesn’t turn out like that ideal, we feel like it’s a failure. Not so! Sometimes we have to walk away from it for a while in order to look at it with different eyes.

I’m learning to walk away for a bit. Give the warp time to tell me what it should be.

Try it with your next challenge. And enjoy the learning experience!

Pleasant Thought

19 Thursday Apr 2018

Posted by jeanweaves in Designing

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Creativity, Design, Weaving

“Proper ornamentation…is pleasant thought expressed in the speech of the tool.”

Detail of opphämta borders

Pleasant thought, the speech of the tool. What a lovely way to describe design well-conceived, craft well-done. Authors from earlier generations certainly had a way with words!

The editor who wrote that line, W. R. Lethaby, is referring to good design. He penned his view in the late Arts and Crafts period in his Editor’s Preface to Hand-Loom Weaving Plain and Ornamental by Luther Hooper (Pitman and Sons, 1925 available on Handweaving.net). It reflects the value of traditional craftsmanship but his premise is still well worth considering.

“Workmanship when separated by too wide a gulf from fresh thought—that is, from design—inevitably decays, and, on the other hand, ornamentation, divorced from workmanship, is necessarily unreal, and quickly falls into affectation.”

Various towel designs

I can weave warp after warp and be technically sound in the weaving, but if I don’t put some thought into the design—color, structure, presentation—it will inevitably become tired. It’s no longer “pleasant thought.” My weaving has to grow.

On the other hand, if I push experimentation too far, making the “ornamentation” the focus, the fabric won’t serve its intended purpose and sounds a sour note. It is trying too hard to be what it’s not. It becomes “divorced from workmanship.”

There are many definitions of good design. What I consider good design may differ from your perspective, but across the spectrum of definition, something that is well-conceived, well-executed stands out. The tools we use may differ, but they all express our sense of design.

This concept goes way beyond what to put on the loom next or what to offer in a sale line. This can – and should — inform our whole design process.

My weaving springs from what I find pleasant. My tool is the loom. What tool do you use to express your pleasant thought?

I Wander As I Weave

23 Friday Feb 2018

Posted by jeanweaves in Damask, Designing, Weaving Inspiration

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creative inspiration, Damask, Weaving

We’ve had a lot of icy weather this past month, at least by Missouri standards. Perfect time to retreat to the studio for some serious warping!

Threading inside the loom

During the course of a year, while weaving fabric for utilitarian textiles, I let my mind wander a bit. Not so much that I lose my place in the treadling, but I do dream about what’s next. What can I weave on the drawloom that will use more draw shafts? Do I set it up for shaft draw or single unit draw? What figure can I come up with that will be easy enough for this rookie single-unit weaver?

And following those wandering thoughts led here—inside the drawloom, threading 468 threads for a single unit 8-thread satin damask. This set-up will allow me to lift individual units of threads randomly for whatever figure I can graph out. It’s more free-form than the repeating patterns of shaft draw weaving but if I want, I can work those in too.

There are so many motifs that can be woven, so many designs that show up in embroidery, knitting, quilting—whatever a person can put her hand to. Mediums often cross too, like the quilt patterns painted on barns.

While tossing around ideas for the newly warped loom, my husband suggested putting one of those barn paintings into the picture. A perfect expression of my family’s dairying and quilting backgrounds.

Barn in progress

Idea met computer sketchpad and after several edits, I took it to the loom. Since this is a learning piece, I’m taking time to evaluate along the way. There will be adjustments if I choose to weave it again, a shadow added here, a line softened there.

And while I weave, I let my mind wander, but not too much!

Design Through the Back Door

28 Tuesday Nov 2017

Posted by jeanweaves in Designing, Weaving Inspiration

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creative inspiration, Design, Weaving

Recently someone asked me to design an apron for his business. After some back and forth, I had a clearer idea of what he wanted and started thinking. I pored over graphed motifs from Medieval textiles, paging through for something to start with. Then I worked on adapting the figures to what the customer wanted and what my equipment can weave. All this designing before a thread is woven.

Design is a loaded word.

Design is a verb, “to conceive, to contrive, to invent…to have as a goal or purpose.”

Design is also a noun, “a decorative or artistic work…a visual composition or pattern.”

A design can be a conspiratorial plot or a figure on a business card or a pattern for a dress. Design encompasses every art and craft form, every building plan, every graphic representation. There are whole college programs built around design–none of which I’ve taken.

Planning in the works

To be honest, design can be intimidating. That’s why I approach it through the back door.

The back door is the service door. It’s the one used to bring in the groceries. It’s the door from the garden, the lawn chair, the grill. It’s the door the dog uses.

Pulling inspiration from the library

The back-door path to design uses what is available and builds on that. It reads whatever books are on the shelf, takes whatever classes or workshops come up, researches techniques that might come in handy.

Then when a challenge comes up, all the bits and pieces of design inspiration quietly come in through that back door, sit down at the kitchen table, and whisper that concept into reality. Design through the back door.

How do you approach your design challenges?

Putting Inspiration to Work

02 Thursday Nov 2017

Posted by jeanweaves in Designing, Opphämta, Weaving Inspiration

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creative inspiration, Opphämta, Weaving

Last spring, during my week-long drawloom class at Vävstuga in Shelburne Falls, Massachusetts, the lovely, vibrant, intricate hangings on every wall made my heart sing. Reds, blues, golds, 8-pointed stars, crosses, and diamonds everywhere I looked.

The hangings echoed the richly decorative weaving of Sweden. Some were in linen, some in wool. Some incorporated Monks Belt, some Smålandsväv, but many were woven in opphämta, a weave in which the heavier pattern floats over or under the plain weave ground fabric. The motifs are old and found in many crafts besides weaving.

All the way home, the patterns and colors played at the edge of my thoughts. How could I apply the techniques I’d learned to my own weaving? How could I adapt those traditional motifs to the equipment I have, the yarns on my shelf? That is, after all, why we go to classes and workshops—to learn new techniques.

Finally, this summer I wound warp for four hangings without any clear plan on specific designs. I just wanted to try my hand at wall hangings like those I’d seen. The first hanging features blues and a few bands of rose. As the patterns grew, it spoke “winter” to me – blue, icy patterns on snow, rose colored sunsets.

“Winter”

After that, the other three seasons just fell into place. “Spring” with bright yellow and red flowers and light spring greens, “Summer” with darker green vines and bluebirds, “Autumn” with acorns and oak leaves.

“Spring”

“Summer”

The warp is 8/2 bleached cotton—I didn’t know if I was ready for the careful warping linen requires – next time. The ground weft is linen. For weft, I used what I have on hand—some linen, some cottolin, some mercerized cotton. I used 17 pattern units on the drawloom threaded in a point which results in symmetrical motifs.

“Autumn”

Of course, as I twisted fringe and assembled the hangings, I already knew things I’ll do differently next time. There’s always a next time. That’s inspiration being put to work.

Loose Ends

20 Friday Oct 2017

Posted by jeanweaves in Designing, Planning

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Finishings, Textiles, Weaving

Fold-over hem

Every piece has loose ends. The fabric is woven, the threads cut, but all those warp threads have to be fastened off somehow.

The purpose often dictates how a piece is finished. Most of what I weave needs a durable finish. I don’t want my handwovens to fray away in the wash. Towels, placemats, napkins, anything that will be washed frequently calls for a folded hem.

Twisted Fringe

I can also twist the fringe. Picture handwoven scarves, shawls,and even blankets, and most often they are finished with fringe. Twisting the fringe controls it. Some yarns have so much life, they just want to tango (or is that “tangle”?) as soon as they are cut from the loom. One of my weaving friends adds beads to give her fringes a little glitz.

And then there is hemstitching. Hemstitching is a decorative finish done on the loom. It binds the warps so when you cut the piece off the loom, it is essentially finished with the exception of washing the piece. The ends can be left to form a fringe or worked with twists, loops, or knots.

When I choose to hemstitch a piece, I leave enough warp at the beginning and end for a fringe. Using weft from the shuttle, I stitch up and over, up and over, across the warp. The first part of the stitch catches the warp.

The second part is worked around the tail of the first stitch to tie the bundle.

Each stitch binds two, three, four or more warps in a bundle.

I use a very simple hemstitch, but there are some wonderfully creative techniques to dress up the hem. Virginia M. West details many hemstitching variations as well as fringes, knots, and added bands in her book Finishing Touches for the Handweaver (1988: Loveland, CO Interweave Press). I know it’s an older book, but so worth it if you can find a copy.

What is your favorite way to tie up loose ends?

jeanweaves

~ Jean Williams, Handweaver

Category Archives: Designing

Look It Up!

Weaver, Know Thyself

Choosing Sides

Barn Raising

Learning Experiences

Pleasant Thought

I Wander As I Weave

Design Through the Back Door

Putting Inspiration to Work

Loose Ends