Twisp of Fate

A year ago I bought a 32″ Macomber loom from a woman in Kingston, WA and blogged about it here.  I named it “Kingston” because that is where it came from, and I liked the sound of it.  I have really been happy with Kingston, it is a great weaving width for doing scarves, towels, shawls etc. and then I can devote my wider 48″ Mac to rugs, blankets, and so forth.  But I have been a little frustrated with the fact that it only had 4 harnesses (4H), thus restricting the types of patterns I can weave on it.  In fact, I have had to use my “Baby Mac” model CP portable workshop loom, which is 20″ wide and has 8 harnesses, to do the polychrome summer & winter scarves, and the placemats I have been doing lately, for exactly this reason.  It is a lot smaller (not as comfortable to sit at for a long time) and just not as beefy as a full-size loom, so really wasn’t what I wanted for a long term solution.

Most B4/B5 model Macs can take up to 10 harnesses (10H), and I intended to add 6 more to Kingston “eventually”, but that is a big chunk of change and I just hadn’t taken the plunge.

Then about a month ago I got wind of someone in Seattle who had a 32″ Mac with 12 harnesses for sale.  In other words, exactly the same loom as Kingston, but with 12H instead of 4H.  I emailed her to explore the idea of buying hers, and selling mine, but I wasn’t sure if this made any kind of sense, or how hard it would be to sell Kingston.

It turns out she is getting a wider, multi-harness countermarch loom (new) but she really liked the 32″ Mac and she suggested we swap looms as she would be happy to have a simpler version (plus some money, of course).  So for a fair amount less money that it would cost to upgrade Kingston to 10H, I now have a “new” Kingston with 12H!  Also, it is newer – Kingston was built in 1961 and this one was built in 1995.  And, she didn’t care about having the sectional warp beam, so I was able to keep the one which came with Kingston!  Regarding the history of the new loom, she bought it from a young woman who graduated with an arts degree and an interest in textiles, who later moved on to other things – this loom had been a graduation gift.  So I am the third owner at this point.

So right after we got back from Port Townsend and the Olympic Peninsula, we made a one-night trip over to Seattle with the cargo trailer and made the exchange.  Both parties are quite happy!

I had a warp on the Baby Mac to finish off, but yesterday and today I put the first warp on the new loom.  It may be called “Madison” (it came from Madison Valley neighborhood in Seattle) – but I really like the name Kingston, and they look so much alike, it may just continue to be “Kingston”.

a “California Rags” placemats underway

from this fabric:

Here are the fabric and resulting “California Rags” placemats I finished up on the Baby Mac last week:

Wierd weather department:

After some lovely sunny days, bringing on lots of new green grass and shooting stars coming up in our yard, we awoke to this today:

April 7, 2013 spring snow!

It did all melt eventually….

A friend from weaving guild told me about a technique called “California Rags ®” developed by Trudie Roberts in 1982 (she recently passed away and was profiled by Handweavers Guild of America on their Facebook page).  She used this technique, in which you weave with strips cut from large motif fabrics alternating with a novelty yarn, mostly for clothing.  It preserves the “picture” from the original fabric in the woven cloth.  I also found an article by Trudie Roberts in an older issue of Handwoven Magazine: “Rag Weave Sweatshirts.” May/June 1989: pp. 60–62, with some more specific information on how to proceed.

I decided to try this out for my other guild challenge project:  Placemats Inspired by a Mug.

I started with some drapery or upholstery fabric samples that measured 17″ x 26″, and a novelty yarn I picked up at the stash reduction sale at knitting retreat last fall.  I think the yarn is cotton and rayon, but no label, so not sure.  The colors were just right to go with the mug, though:

the mug, the fabric & the yarn

Tied onto the existing warp on my Baby Mac workshop loom (the warp was for the Bronson Lace placemats blogged about previously) – using some colors of 8/4 cotton carpet warp that also came from the mug.  12 epi, 167 ends for a width of 13.9″ on the loom, and about 13″ off loom.

I washed and pressed the fabric first, as some of these showroom samples seem to have sizing on them.  Then I cut it into 3/8″ strips and, carefully preserving the order, began to weave them in with alternating shots of the novelty yarn.

When used for clothing, the edges can be ignored since they will be serged and/or incorporated in a seam.  But I had to deal with the bits hanging off either end so I would have a finished edge for the placemat.  I wound up tucking the ends into the next fabric shed (not the next yarn shed) before laying in and beating the next strip.  This seems to work pretty well.

I really had fun with this and am very happy with the results:

Mat #2 with the mug that inspired it

Both mats (fabric samples were not exactly the same in layout)