Pictures of me warping the loom at the Ren Faire :)

A big thank you to Mistress Maol for taking some pictures of me and my loom at the Ren Faire Demo.  I never remember to ask someone to take pictures of me doing something - I'll take them of what I'm doing, just not me doing it :)

 These are pictures of me chaining the warp.  This keeps the sheds clear so that threads don't "migrate" and it causes the sheds to move together better.

 


 

 Theses are the new, easier to transport without breakage, weights that my husband made.  They are pieces of travertine tile shaped to look like period weights.  They travel so much better than the unfired clay and they are a lot cheaper. 

 

Amazing videos from the Norsk Folke Museum

While trying searching different combinations of words related to warp weighted weaving, I stumbled upon a treasure trove of documentary videos published by the Norsk Folkemuseum 

The videos are silent documentaries that have screen card explanations of what's happening (the same as the old black and white movies from the 1920's here).  They were all shot in the late 1940s to mid 1950's. I am so excited - I wish I could read Norwegian (I'll have to translate some of it when I get a chance). It's very interesting to see all the different variations as it seems each weaver or weavers has their own method in warping their loom.

Group of  house wives in 1950's Norway warping a loom.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a19lGJGOZWY

Woman using a warp weighted loom to weave a strap.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZL7tYOT8KpU

These are my favorite - They show in detail from start to finish the warping and weaving of a rug/bed cover.  The first video doesn't have as much weaving, but it shows the rugs/bed covers in their many uses.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XUm2JvsLzx8 Video 1

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qxA1bpj6lB0 Video 2

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6PD-FASC6ZQ Video 3 

You tube videos that show a demonstration done in England in 2011

I found these on You Tube -

 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DhngvOSaxes

Her loom is warped with three heddle bars with looks to be a diamond twill.  You can also clearly see how she has used packs of cards on either side to add a selvage edge to the fabric.

 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7FDTDIVUmk4

In the second video you can really see how important the pin beater is to scallop the weft up - especially in a wide and more complex pattern like she is weaving...

Parking these here so I can watch them a few more times :)

So starts the research for peiod warp thread materials...

With weaving, especially on a weighted loom using hand spun wool, the kind of roving/wool used is very important.
Why? It's simple - stretch.  Short staple (the length of the fibers) stretch.  It's great for things that are knitted, crocheted, or even Naalbound, but not for weaving.  For weaving stretch is not a good thing and adding weight just makes it stretch more.
So what I'm looking for is a long staple wool, from an unaltered breed.
Unaltered breed - what's that you say?
Well, as you may or may not know, people like to tinker with mixing different breeds of animals together to produce an animal that is better suited to their needs.  This is normally not a bad thing, however, for the purpose of authenticity, using an unaltered breed is the best idea. (i.e.Anglo-Saxons would not have has access to wool from a sheep that didn't exist until 1847 :)
Lucky for me, England is actually into preserving unaltered breeds and ordering my roving is now just a few clicks away...Yay inter-webs!

Here is a website that I found that carries roving from unaltered breeds here in the US:
http://www.spinderellas.com/lwsheepbreeds.html

For my purpose I may use this one:

Cotswold originated in the hills of Gloucestershire, England from indigenous stock and is one of the oldest breeds known to us. It has contributed to the ancestry of other breeds in UK and Europe. It is large with a white face, wool on the legs, with a characteristic lock of wool on the forehead. Cotswold sheep are noted for their long, strong fiber, with lustrous natural wavy curls.

• AVERAGE FIBER DIAMETER
  Micron 33-40
  USDA Wool Grade 36’s-46’s
• GREASE FLEECE WEIGHT Ewe 12-15 lbb - WASHING YIELD 60%
• STAPLE LENGTH 12-15" - though many are sheared twice a year.

Playing catch up/pictures owed...

I owe some elevation outfit pictures and so I'll post those first.
My elevation outfit was late Anglo-Saxon and completely documented.  My colors are green and gold and so I choose the shades of green and gold linen that I used because they were the colors that matched colors known to exist in period from the Regia Dye Project.  The dresses were sewn together with a blue contrasting linen thread - this was symbolic (as well as period decoration) in that Lorcann's colors are blue and silver (I sewed his Knighting clothes with green thread).  The dresses were sewn entirely by hand using the documented stitching technique of sewing the garment together using running stitch, then because it's linen, going back and felling all the seams.  The trim on the dress is blue silk, again taken from the Regia Dye Project, and accented with gold silk embroidery thread using a stem stitch. 

My new warp weighted loom is portable :)

My big loom was just too big to take places and weave for demonstration purposes. Lucky for me, Lorcann was nice enough to build me one that breaks down to fit inside my Hyundai Santa Fe. It's max width is about 36", but that is more than enough for the average little project. Recently the Barony of Wyvernwood has been demonstrating at the Bay Area Renaissance Faire so we determined that taking it out there would be a good test run.


This is the loom warped with weaving in progress.


















This is an up close shot of the weaving.  This is a basket weave - technically a half basket as the pattern is 2 warp threads to one weft thread.  Basket weave means that the threads are in a 2:2 ratio versus a 1:1 ration for a tabby weave.  Anything besides those two weaves requires another heddle bar.  There is a little bit of drawing in at the top, which I probably could have fixed, but it's not that big a deal.  The baby still requires a great of attention and reweaving wasn't "in the cards".  Besides, I can just cut that part off as this will become a leg wrap for Lorcann eventually.  He does benefit from making me things ;)



















This is a shot of the chained warp.  As you can see it's not a huge warp because I wanted to be able to accomplish at least the warping in the time that I was out at the Faire.





















This is an up close of the heddles.  They moved around some, but they did their job.











This is a picture of me in the process of warping the cards to weave the the warp into the header band.













These are some shots of my loom without any warp as it had just been completed.

...Three years later

It has been a very busy three years. The next event after my elevation, my husband won Crown list. This of course left little time for weaving. After we stepped down,we both got new jobs in Tampa and had to go about the business of moving, dealing with the old house, and renovating the new one. Once that was on its way, we started another project, and Lukus Patrick Tallent joined us on June 12th 2013. So yes, a busy three years. Lately things have been calming down a bit and I've had more time to work on fiber arts projects again. I'll hopefully be posting some of the new things I've been doing (I now have a portable warp weighted loom) as well as some of the various things I have made over the last couple years. Stay tuned :)