Some time late last year I bought a painted silk warp from Carr Park Artisan's similar to this one. It was 200 ends and 6 1/2 yards long. Not really wide enough and not really long enough but I loved the colours! Also, it's *silk* , the princess of natural fibres!
I knew the 16 shaft draft I wanted to use as it has the beautiful effect of playing with colour and make them appear to flow and shift. Draft #78116 at Handweaving.net / designed by Ingrid Boesel in the Thrilling Twills Collection.
Picture 'borrowed' from Carr Park Artisans
I dug deep in the stash and found a silk bronze gold and a rich silk purple and these gave me nice borders and a width for the scarves I could feel good about. At 28 epi, the 200 ends would have looked like a neck tie! Here's a peek at the warp on the loom and you can see the flow of the colors.
At first I thought I might never be able to weave again. We use our backs so much in the motions of everything we do at a loom. Then an MRI showed that I have several disc issues and stenosis, plus my spine moved forward by 9 mm at L3-4 with the disc shifting out the back by 6 mm. Bending forward is a risky thing for me. I raise up my Spring onto crates to do the tie-up and sit on a low stool. This involves bending / leaning forward and I'd rather not do this. I love this loom and bought it new 16 years ago and have kept it full and busy all that time. But with the Megado, there's no tie up to deal with at all.
Besides, there isn't any weaving I can't do on the Megado loom from 2 shafts to 16, and as I always said "there is only one bum for a bench" 😁 I have also acquired a LOT of tools, equipment and books over the last 28-30 years and its time to downsize voluntarily and not end up as one of those "dead weaver estate sales". I have to say the extra money, space and reduction of stuff is liberating! Once the Spring loom has moved onto a new home, I'm even thinking of getting a nice comfy chair so I can sit in the empty alcove and read.
But the Spring is still has a warp being woven (slowly) off and that is all down the road for now.....
Meet Fairy Garden.... woven with olive 8/2 tencel and measures 11" wide by 80 inches long. Yup, I lost count from weaving one session 7 months ago to more recent. My notes vanished in the meantime.
The colours flow as I had imagined....
Yes, it's the same scarf but the sun washed out the colours. The true colour is the other photos.
For the second scarf I had to think hard about a warp colour.... and the best option was a 10/2 tencel in a pale gold. I bought a 3 pound cone of it off of Ebay years ago and it never disappoints. Its also not available anymore sadly.
It's 11" by 72".... so a good length. Seems the 6.5 yard warp was enough after all as I took my fringe length from the loom waste at either end. I also didn't get my customary sample for my notes.
I wouldn't have been able to resist that warp either - and what fun colours to come back to after your long rest. Love them both.
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