Warmest Chick in the World

Challenge time for Dunedin Creative Fibre Festival. I've been feeling guilty about not entering anything in the national exhibition so when I realised I still had time to put an entry in the challenge I thought I had better do so. I usually like the challenges - some better than others. This time it was something to be inspired by the flora and fauna of Otago.

I have had a basket of soft kid mohair sitting beside my loom for so long I had almost stopped seeing it, but recently two people (weavers of course) independently saw it and drew my attention back to it. 

How perfect is that to represent these fluffy yellow-eyed penguin chicks!

 

I had some silver-grey synthetic boucle to use for a warp at 10 epi so it was very quick to get started and also quick to weave - one shuttle, plain weave.

Here's a close up.

 

Next day - ta da - we have a shawl. 

I did my normal Philippine edges and twisted fringes and there it is.

I call it "Warmest Chick in the World"

 

Travel Time

The annual Professional Weavers' Network seminar was held this year at Coopers Beach in Northland. What a picturesque place!

Our friend Agnes had organised it as well as masterminding an exhibition that she and UK weaver Stacey Harvey-Brown have been working on for some time and now have ready to take to Europe. Stacey was our key speaker and she was to take a workshop after the seminar before travelling through NZ taking workshops and ending up at the CF festival in Dunedin. The highlight of our seminar was attending the opening of Agnes and Stacey's exhibition based on land forms, 'Nature in the Making' at The Earth House' at Peria, a great privilege for us as there is only one other showing of it in NZ, at Oxford North Canterbury 12 April - 7 May. Here are just a few of my favourite photos from the opening, starting with Agnes's stalactites hanging from a tree in the courtyard.

 And these indoors are Stacey's. She's a collapse weave expert and thinks on a grand scale!

Agnes excelled herself with her gorgeous silk network drafting and beautifully executed jacquard weaving. Below is part of a large tryptich of fossilised sand dunes in North America.

And here are the two of them who produced it all while half a world away from each other.

And just a few pics of the quirky venue.

Quite a Day

A very satisfying day. Joan and I set up a display of weaving over the years as part of a plan by the Museum to enhance the Girling Building, one of the Heritage buildings in Brayshaw Park.  Here are some of my items and yes, some of them deserve the title of museum pieces.

This curtain is actually white and quite dainty but very hard to photograph against the bright Marlborough sunshine. From the other side I just got a reflection of myself. The tatted lace incorporates pearl drop beads.
Then it was back to the loom and half an hour's work saw me cutting bulk teatowels off the loom.  There's  quite a bit of hemming to do here so that will be a job for me next time I go to Wellington.

Then I was able to start winding a warp for a wrap with the beautiful red alpaca and silk yarn that I love.

All going well a navy one will follow . . . but I've also ordered some silk for scarves . . . .

Cross Country Samples I

On a somewhat smaller scale but almost as much fun I have been facing the challenge of my CCW group to provide samples in a honeycomb weave.  I have never been excited about honeycomb as it seemed to be very restricted in use being a one-sided fabric (I thought) only useful for upholstery or lined bags or cushions where the back was not seen. How wrong I was.  When other people's samples started arriving (while I was still thinking) it was apparent that it could be woven double faced and perfectly reversible. Why did I not know this?  I went to the book the draft had been taken from and did a 5 minute research.  As well as the double faced draft there was also one for a double layer honeycomb.  I still have no idea what I would use such a fabric for but the structure of it was a technical challenge and all of a sudden I was keen to try it.  Instead of warping up in stripes each the width of a cell, I warped  light and dark threads alternately across the width. This resulted in all the white warp on one surface and all the dark on the reverse. So white weft weaves with white on top, dark weft weaves with dark underneath but opposite cells are mixed dark and light so it appears as though there are stripes anyway. Here is my sample, back and front. 

Now I am keen to try a different type of honeycomb for my 'own choice' samples. 

Finishing the Blue Tablecloth

This is more like me. School holidays often see me away from my loom, spending time with my special grandson Liam.  I always have to take hand work with me to do . . . there has to be more in life than ironing shirts!  This time I had the finishing to do on the big blue tablecloth, first hemming the ends and then faggoting the panels together with a featherstitch insertion.  When I have done this before I have 'just done it', keeping the spacing even in my hands without any device to keep the width even.  This time I felt that it may prove troublesome in such a big piece with the weight potentially causing a problem so I invented a system with a small, slim book and a couple of bulldog clips . . . like this.

It progressed well till about the last half metre when Puppy Piper tried to make a meal of the absolute last of the cotton.

Here is the before and after.  No, it did not fade in the wash, I just took the 'after' photo in bright light.  The cotton survived well enough but one of my precious LeClerc bobbins is gone forever.  Those splinters are sharp so Piper was lucky not to do herself an injury.  She is usually very well behaved but anything on the floor is fair game and I must have let it roll off so I guess I can't blame her.  How could I growl when she looks at me . . . .

Anyway, all's well that ends well, and here is the end of work on the blue cloth.  What will I do with it?  I hope it will end up in an exhibition of some sort sooner or later.

PWN Exhibition at Fibre Spectrum, Nelson

For the month of January Peg and I, along with Sue Broad and Jane Clark, are exhibiting as the Top of the South members of the Professional Weavers' Network of NZ. The venue is Fibre Spectrum, a cooperative shop run by fibre enthusiasts for over 20 years.  The space is small but there are great nooks and crannies to show work on the walls or on plinths. Here are my exhibits.

There are more photos on the Marlborough Weavers' blog, marlboroughweavers.blogspot.com and on pegsweavingblog.blogspot.co.nz

Happy New Year

For some years now friend Meg has encouraged her weaving colleagues to post an update of 'what's on the loom(s)' on the first day of the year.  For the first time I have a blog of my own to do this. It's just a pity I'm not in a better space to show my work.  I have two looms and they have both ground to a halt waiting for me to make decisions or find different weft yarns.  On my countermarch loom I have been weaving a table runner for a family commission.

Colours were intended to be predominantly red, grey and black with small amounts of other colours taken from an art work on the wall behind the table. What transpired was nothing like my original intention and just proves that I am a weaver, NOT a designer.  I cut off this piece, washed and pressed it, then went back to the loom and dropped off warp ends, changed others and re-sleyed.  I don't know that I am any happier with the result, but will find a different yarn for the weft as this piece has slub linen/cotton both ways.  But I think it needs to be back to the drawing board completely.

On my jack loom I have a similar story, but not quite so messy.  It is warped up with white cotton for napkins which I hoped to team up with a blue tablecloth.  I wove six in plain weave with a small lace motif in one corner and then ran out of yarn.  I cut off the six and have them washed and pressed and ready to hem next time I go to visit family and need to take  hand work to do.  I would photograph them if I could find them! (Yes, I do seem to be having a senior moment.)  The warp is now tied up and ready to go again but I'm not happy with the two alternative wefts I've tried. I think I need to re-sley it as it seems a bit too close. 

I hate all this indecision; it is not characteristic of me and I hope  it is not an omen for the year to come.

My table loom is in hibernation mode, wrapped in a blanket in my garage where it will stay until our weaving group decides they would like another workshop. Who knows what that will be about.

I'm looking forward to seeing what other people are doing and hoping for inspiration.