Handwoven May/June 2021

from the editor

A friend told me that she once hid in her closet to start a new knitting project. She and her husband were working in the yard together, and all she could think about was the new yarn and pattern she had bought the day before. She finally succumbed, made up an excuse, and went inside to knit… inside a closet. Maybe that wasn’t the best solution, but I understand the feeling. There is nothing quite like a new project and yarn to go with it. Currently, I’m looking for something new. We’ve been staying home for more than a year now, and my looms are empty. I just finished a set of towels on one loom, samples for placemats on another, and over the weekend, I finally cut off a dog…

future themes

SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2021 Detail Oriented How do you make an ordinary weaving project extraordinary? It’s often the details that make the difference. It might be a simple trick you often employ, a complicated specific technique for a unique project, or even a finish that’s more than just twisting fringe. We’re looking for projects that go the extra mile. NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2021 Reflecting on Deflecting Deflection is caused by multiple factors including weave structure and yarn choice. This issue will feature techniques that cause deflection and the beautiful projects that result. JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2022 Deep Stash We all have yarn stashes, but have we ever looked at them critically? What yarns should be in a stash? How should you care for a stash? This issue will feature projects and articles that are all about using, expanding, or improving your stash.…

letters

I enjoyed reading both articles in the March/April 2021 issue about weaving five-shaft patterns on four-shaft looms; Susan’s lovely bed runner shows that it is indeed possible to weave more complicated patterns on simple four-shaft looms. Thank you for bringing older ideas forward and making them available to a new audience. Mary Meigs Atwater to Carol Thilenius to Susan E. Horton to the next weaver is a nice chain. I was reminded of Dorothy Burton’s monograph, Versatile Bronson (Weavers’ Guild of Boston, 1984), in which she quoted Carol Thilenius’s 1974 Interweave article about this technique. Dorothy described a second method that she used that involved a heddle bar placed behind the shafts and on top of the warp. This is also a slow technique as the heddle bar must be raised…

somewhere in time

To achieve that vision, I used shaft switching on the Harrisville Rug Loom and changed colors many times as I wove. I gradated my colors often, thereby imbuing the piece with color. The resultant rug is reminiscent of an amazing place: Mackinac Island during the lilac blooming season. For my palette, I chose various shades of deep purples, lavenders, and greens. You can almost smell the lovely scent of lilacs in the air and hear the waves of Lake Huron that surround the island. As I wove this piece with lilacs in mind, someone suggested Somewhere in Time as a title, a reference to the Upper Peninsula’s Mackinac Island lilacs and the movie of the same name filmed there in 1979. I thought it was a great fit! My chosen yarn…

a checkered (and plaided) history

As Momma’s favorite warm-weather standard, the checks of gingham float through my memories of childhood summers in the form of elasticized bandeau-and-shorts sets, snazzy one-piece playsuits that tied at the shoulders, and shortie pajamas. My sisters and I aged out of gingham when we reached school age, graduating into a clothing world that included plaid dresses, plaid jumpers, plaid coats, plaid scarves, and plaid hair ribbons. To my mind, checks evoke warm weather, Judy Garland’s blue gingham pinafore from The Wizard of Oz, the large-checked pants in gaudy colors favored by clowns, the black-and-white checkered flag of the Indy 500, and picnic tables covered by ubiqui-tous red-and-white check tablecloths. Plaids remind me of nippy weather, school uniforms, winter coats, and flannel nightgowns. Checks are made of lightweight cottons and linens, plaids…

media picks

THREAD MAGIC: Weaving for Shape and Texture Lotte Dalgaard and Paulette Adam Authors Lotte Dalgaard and Paulette Adam have studied the effects of active yarns for quite some time. This book is the culmination of much of that study. For Dalgaard and Adam, an active yarn is one that changes in appearance during wet-finishing, either in length or thickness, without the use of special chemicals. The book focuses on crêpe yarns (overtwisted or elastic yarns), Lycra blends, and shrink yarns: yarns with a polyester core that contracts with steaming. Fabrics woven with active yarns shrink much more than those woven with other yarns. During wet-finishing, they pleat, bubble, ripple, and twist, creating astonishing fabrics. Although the authors discuss a variety of weave structures, they focus primarily on plain weave and doubleweave. In those…