What toppings do you like on your tie-up pizza?
A tie-up is like a pizza: the bigger it is, the more slices you can chop it into. A tie-up is also like a pizza in that you can put different toppings on each slice. (I know that sounds like a stretch, but bear with me.) In the What is Twill? course, we discussed that […]
1 + 1 = 1? How weaving defies mathematics
Here is a little bit of weaving trivia for you; when does one plus one equal one? This seems impossible, based on what we’re taught in grade school. However, one plus one DOES equal one when you are talking about warps and tying a new warp onto an old one. There are many reasons to […]
How to walk your treadles, and why you might want to
Have you ever heard someone say “I walked the treadles”, or “I use a walking treadle order”? This may sound strange or confusing, but it’s actually a very practical method for making treadling easier. A “walking treadle order” is a treadling pattern where the weaver uses their feet in an alternating fashion, as if they […]
How to choose the best reed (and sleying order) when the perfect reed is not available
Many weavers have a limited number of reeds available to them. If you have a 12 dent reed, and the project you are working on has a 24 epi Sett, you simply sley 2 ends in each dent. Easy peasy! What happens if you DON’T have the perfect reed available? Example 1: Anne Hiemstra ran […]
Fix a wrong sett – WITHOUT resleying
As you probably know, sett is critical to getting your project right: if it’s too open, the weft beats in too much and covers the warp. If it’s too close, the fabric can wind up stiff and unsuitable for its purpose. When working with a new yarn or a new structure, we usually make a […]
How to fix your twill when neither side matches the drawdown – and gain more design options as a result!
Have you ever started weaving and realized that the fabric on the loom doesn’t look like the drawdown or picture? That happened to Susan Palwick recently, so she posted pictures of her drawdown (draft #80355 from Handweaving.net) and her fabric on Facebook, and asked if anyone could help figure out what was happening. Most of […]
How to measure YPP or MPKG without a yarn balance
If you don’t have a yarn balance you can determine yards per pound (YPP) or meters per kilogram (MPKG) of a yarn by measuring a known length and extrapolating from its weight. A short length is bound to be too light for most scales to weigh accurately, so the best approach is to wind yourself […]
Ending Shaft Envy
Once upon a time, I was under the illusion that more shafts are always better. Because on a loom with eight shafts, you can weave four-shaft designs as well as eight-shaft ones, so you get more design freedom. But why stop there? On a 16-shaft loom, you can weave four, eight, and twelve-shaft designs (not […]
Colour your Heddles!
Have you ever started threading a project, and JUUUUST before you finish, you realise that you don’t have enough heddles on one or more shafts? This can happen for a few reasons. You might have made a mistake in your threading, or an error in your calculations. Most likely though, you made an error in […]
No Fuss Floating Selvedges
I’m not a fan of floating selvedges. Moving their weights, separating them from the threaded ends they’re next to, lifting them up to go under or pushing them down to go over – that all detracts from my weaving experience. Anything that slows me down and interrupts my weaving zen irritates me every single time. […]
