tablet weaving and sprang

Posted on May 3, 2012 by sashweaver

I’ve heard of pieces of sprang cloth that start out as warp set between two pieces of tablet weaving, and wanted to try it myself. I started two pieces of tablet weaving and then solicited help from a friend. We sat at my table and each of us worked on one of the bits of tablet weaving. As we worked we passes another weft, a plum-colored silk, back and forth across the five-and-a-half feet that separated us.

tablet weaving holds the warp for sprang

Keeping the tension even on the plum colored warp was a bit of a trick. We tried several things. What seemed to work best was a combination of supporting the threads in the middle, and attaching a rod (knitting needle) on the outside edge of the tablet weaving to hold the plum colored threads evenly.

Here’s the tablet weaving up close:

tablet woven edge for sprang

The tablet weaving completed, I hung it on my sprang frame and ‘spranged’ it. Yes, it was a bit of a reach at first. I worked each row in sections, and used a long dowel to hold each row. Each row was then shifted down towards the lower tablet-woven band.

weaving the tabletwoven warp

Now I’ll have to get someone to photograph me in my new sprang shirt!

sprang socks

Posted on April 18, 2012 by sashweaver

Quite a while ago I started a pair of socks. The warp’s been hanging off the backside of my kitchen door, waiting while other more pressing projects have attracted my attention.
Now it’s time to finish those socks.

Sprang socks with decorative pattern

Now, sprang is quite elastic, but not so elastic that the same tube allows for my ankles as well as for my calfs. Once finished, I confess, I ‘unwove’ a thread at the back, and inserted a ‘gusset’ of more threads.

The 'V' at the back is the evidence of the added threads, creating the gusset.

The socks were finished off by tying the threads in bunches of four. I am quite impressed that there is no need for elastic. The socks stay up just fine without elastic at the top

Commuter Hat Project

Posted on March 16, 2012 by sashweaver

Inspired by Franco Rios, as well as a former student, I’ve made a hat. The method used means the project can easily be stowed in a commuter bag, and worked on the bus.

Materials needed: yarn, tape, a small stick, scissors

I cut pieces of handspun into 17 pieces, each 36 inches long: eight pink, one white, eight pink.

Threads are folded in half around the stick, and taped to a surface.

So, I was working with 17 x 2, that is to say 34 threads.

Work in plain interlinking stitches, free-end braiding

I decided I like this pattern. I can count rows by the number of white hatches that appear, one set of hatches for every two rows.

After 32 rows (16 white hatches) the decrease begins

Decrease by tying threads together in pairs. I tied off two pairs every second row, and cut the ends short.

Six sets of decreases were worked, that is removing 24 threads, and ten were left. I worked those ten for two rows, and then set the piece aside.

The first strip is finished

I worked nine such pieces, and then sewed them together.

The strip curls, yes. But sewn together they get better.

Sewing up one side of the strip with a white strand

To match the white-stripe pattern, I used another strand of the same white thread. I sewed up one side of the strip before joining.

Be careful to keep the knots of the decreases all on the same side (inside) of the hat.

Join each piece to the other pieces, matching the white strip pattern with your sewing stitch.

Sewing down the other side, the piece is joined to the others. The joining stitching should look exactly like the white stripe down the center of each piece.

Once all the pieces were sewn together, I gathered the ends into a fringe or pompom.

The finished hat set over a kitchen bowl, the brim spread out

I decided to thread some elastic cord through at the brim, to make it into a tam.

Festival 2012

Posted on February 21, 2012 by sashweaver

I set up my 4-harness loom for this year’s Festival. We’re commemorating the 200th anniversary of the arrival of the Selkirk Settlers. They attempted to build an income spinning the hair of bison and weaving it into cloth. The local weavers guild agreed to help me weave brown cloth. I set up my loom.

setting up the loom to weave 'bison colored' wool

Meanwhile outside they were preparing the snow sculptures.

creating snow sculptures

This woman came to see me. She learned fingerweaving from my book. She’s also made herself a sprang hat.
She said she made it in strips, and sewed them together.

Multi colored sprang hat to match the fingerwoven scarf

She wove the strips for about 4 inches, then began tying the strings off in pairs, hiding the knots inside the hat. This created the ‘decrease’. Remaining strings formed the tassel.

Another view of that hat

She was very pleased with the way you can make a perfectly invisible seam.
I find her work ingenius, and really like this hat!

No Frame Sprang

Posted on January 28, 2012 by sashweaver

I’ve worked sprang without a loom, trying different methods.
Well, to begin, here are two frames that I like for the ease of construction and minimal cost.
The first is very like an Archie Brennan frame.
It’s plumbing pipe, elbows, threaded rod and nuts.
At the hardware store, if you ask for half-inch pipe, also ask for half-inch threaded rod.

Plumbing pipe sprang frame

Now, you might want to duct-tape the elbow joints to the plumbing pipe, to avoid the disaster of those joints coming loose while you work. The beauty of this frame is the ease with which you measure out the warp directly onto the frame. The tension adjustment is with the nuts on the threaded rod.

A student brought another frame to a sprang class. I’ve found a local woodworker who will make more of these frames.

Another sprang frame

detail of frame construction

Either of these frames can be adjusted as the tension in the cloth increases. You can also purchase different lengths of dowel or plumbing pipe to accomodate longer warps.

Now for the No-Frame ideas.

Weaving a hat, backstrap method

The upper bar was laid across a table top.Chairs were placed on either side of me, pushed up tight to the table. They held the bar in place. The lower bar (chopsticks) were tensioned backstrap method.

For longer warps, I’ve been known to attach to my kitchen door. Here I’m working on a pair of socks, two socks created at the same time. I work at a comfortable height, and shove each row upwards and then downwards.

Working sprang without a frame, using a door

When the work progressed and working height became uncomfortable, I transferred the attachment site to a hook in the wall. Tension in both cases was provided by my feet.

The work continues, sitting on a chair

Sprang Rainbow Sweater

Posted on January 27, 2012 by sashweaver

A moment of weakness in a local yarn shop had me purchasing a skein of lace weight silk&baby camel. Marrakesh is the name on the skein, Swiss Mountain Silk. I’ve made it up into two of scarfs for exhibit purposes.

Rainbow scarf in an exhibit set

I still had quite a bit of yarn left and did some math. Calculations indicated that perhaps I could make the rest of the skein into a vest. Voila the results.

Circular warp cloth

Sprang Rainbow Sweater

That circular warp cloth that I made folds in half to make a vest. OK, a couple of confessions. Firstly the yarn was a bit fuzzy. I slathered it with sizing to facilitate shoving the shed around. Secondly, that neck hole …. I wove the piece of cloth, and then cut two threads at the very middle, and unravelled six inches in either direction. Cutting two threads meant that I could tie them together at the base of the V-neckline in front and in back. Thirdly, this vest is a rather petite adult size. For myself I’d like it a bit longer and wider. To make a sweater to fit me, I’m thinking I’m going to have to create a skein that is a bit longer in circumference than your standard skein, and rainbow dye it myself.

sprang frame

Posted on January 12, 2012 by sashweaver

A student brought a frame to class. I like it a lot.

Here's the frame that I like

Here's the top of the frame.

I got my son to make me such a frame and find it sturdy as well as flexible. For longer projects I can just get longer dowels.

Sprang frame in use

January Experiments

Posted on January 7, 2012 by sashweaver

I recently finished up another of those silk officer sashes.

Silk Sash Finished

I’ve been experimenting with different types of silk. Reeled silk is best because the fibers are nice and long. I’ve found that silk cording gives a better look, and probably better wear. Original silk sashes that I have examined seem to be composed of several very fine strands all worked as one. I tried doing just that and found the ‘hand’ of the results to be quite lovely. Working with multiple strands, keeping them all in their proper bunches was a bit of a headache, made the weaving go lots slower.

In other news, a researcher dealing with a mummie and associated textiles has got me playing with that 3-3 interlacing. The mummie cloth had the arrows in the cloth going sideways to the way I usually do the 3-3 interlacing. So I set me up a warp and had a good look at my 3-3 interlacing, and worked the new warp sideways. Now something niggled in my brain, and I went back to Collingwood. Sure enough Collingwood describes ‘horizontal ribs’ as well as ‘vertical ribs’. Here are my trial pieces, done in free-end braiding:

3-3 Interlacing, horizontal and vertical ribs

End of the year projects

Posted on December 31, 2011 by sashweaver

Been working on a variety of projects.
Made a couple of variations of an intertwined bag.

Intertwined bag with red and green stripes

Intertwined bag, the loops carry the drawstring

The same sort of bag, but in silk

Now these bags are sprang bags. They come from a figure-8 warp, the join line is the bottom of the bag. They were worked in intertwining rather than interlinking. Not as stretchy as interlinking but attractive in their own way.
Also made a couple more hats. Here are two hats, one has twice the number of threads. One is sort of a hair net, the other, is much more like a tam, both made from the same skein of red sock yarn.

The red hair net

The second hat, using more threads

Now, freshly ‘spranged’ they always curl up funny. Do not let this discourage you. Blocking is easily done, and remedies the curling when you’ve used natural fibers.

Fresh sprang always wants to curl.

This is remedied by blocking. I soaked the hat, and then stretched it around a kitchen bowl.

Red hat being blocked around a bowl

Canadian Amazon

Posted on November 24, 2011 by sashweaver

My books are now available on Amazon.ca.
They’ve been available through the.com version of Amazon for a while now, but Canadians looked for them on the .ca version of Amazon, hoping for domestic shipping, and so far have been dissapointed.
No More!
Fingerweaving Untangled and Le Fléché Démêlé are now available on amazon.ca.