it's not too far from idea to finished product around here, where weaving is concerned

you might say these tea towels started in 1964, even though they were woven in the past couple of weeks. they're based on a setup for tea towels that emmy wove back then when she attended the danish "husflidsskole" in kerteminde, under the strict guidance of stampe. they have a "gåseøje" pattern (sorry, i still only know weaving terminology in danish)

when we impulsively decided to inaugurate her new loom with a round of christmas tea towels to sell at our local museum up to christmas, she remembered that long ago pattern and got out some of the ones she wove back then. she had saved them carefully, but they are frayed in spots and worn a bit beyond use after 62 years. fair enough.

molly loves them all the more for it. she insisted on sitting on them, enjoying their warmth and softness as i prepared the new, festive version for hemming. it's the dark time of the year, and i only just put them in for a first wash, so no photos in good light as of yet. it's been awhile, but i do promise to be back soon with those. 

weaving secret messages

i'm not sure if i've mentioned this here, but husband is the kind of guy who is utterly unafraid to rethink things. so after we added the new roof a few years ago, he decided to move the stairs to get to the second floor from where he had originally thought they would be. this involved building a couple of extra meters onto the back of the house. as one does. but it being a rather large undertaking and him being a one-man show, he has discovered that they don't match up 100% as accurately as he would have liked. he thinks this can be hidden by covering that portion of the ceiling with a really cool weaving. 

as one has the weaving bug, i am on board with this, so i am very deep in planning what said weaving should look like. it's not a tiny undertaking, as it's 166cm wide and about 6 meters long. times two. so needless to say, i am looking for inspiration, as i'm still a baby weaver. i know that my loom can handle whatever i throw its way, as it's much more experienced and wise than i am. 

i have this idea that whatever i weave, needs to contain a secret, meaningful message. and since i've been spending a lot of time in the studio, working on a podcast for work, it hit me that it would be possible to weave sound waves. they would look like a cool pattern and if you knew what it represented, it would also contain a message. since that occurred to me, i can't shake the idea. i recorded a meaningful message in the studio the other day and took a photo of the sound wave. i think it has potential.

i ordered up a bunch of weaving books from the library. this one about danish weaver bodil bødtker-næss had some very interesting inspiration in it. it was all i could do not to write and underline everywhere in the book, but i did restrain. i've definitely got to order this one so that i can write in my own copy.

and fold down a bunch of pages, like this one. she wove panels to divide a big open office space for danske bank back in the 70s. they don't look entirely unlike sound waves, eh?

this one could also have a sound wave vibe.

and this one definitely does. i don't think i will directly copy any of these, but they do give me some ideas for how i could approach this. combined with the idea of mounting a weaving on a wooden frame, which i saw at hanne vedel's workshop, i think an idea is forming. but i've yet to settle on a color scheme. i'm doing a few watercolor sketches to try to work out some ideas. i think husband will even build a tiny miniature version of the frames we might want to mount the weavings on, so we can create a paper version. 

i made a test sheet with all of my potential colors. i got some cool gansai tambi japanese watercolors to play with. 

the planning is half the fun. but husband is impatient for me to get started. i'm not even sure yet what kind of yarn to use - linen? wool? cotton? it's quite the adventure.

danish weaver hanne vedel

the amazing danish weaver hanne vedel, who is 94 and still weaving, held an open house during the autumn holiday last week. we went to visit her. she was taught to weave by cis fink, one of the classic old danish weaving teachers who originally owned my loom. this photo above is of hanne vedel on the left and emmy, my personal weaving teacher and the one who gave me my loom, which once belonged to cis fink. i feel so privileged to have met hanne vedel and even more privileged to own a loom with such history. 

hanne vedel is one of the most prolific and famous danish weavers of the 20th century. this is a bolt of cloth that she wove for the curtains for the upgrade of the trustee council chamber (also known here in denmark as the finn juhl chamber) at the UN building in new york. so simple, but so beautiful. 

we spent nearly two hours at her studio, just looking at everything and being inspired. this wall hanging gave me an idea for some weavings that i want to do for our home (more about that in another post soon).

i need to weave some long panels for a steeply vaulted wall above our stairs and i've been pondering how we could fix them to the wall so that they don't sag. this might be a way to approach it. 

this work looked different, depending on the angle you stood in relation to it. i'm not sure my project will be able to do that because you can never get up high enough to look at it from the one angle, but it was inspiring nonetheless.

i sent husband past her studio on the monday after our visit, so that he could look at the frame this piece was mounted on. now i just have to figure out my version. 

hanne vedel is still actively weaving. she had projects set up on two looms. this one, involving horse hair, was also super inspiring. i have so many ideas now and not enough time or enough looms to execute them all!

now i just need to find someone with a horse that wants to trim its mane or tail. 

look how lovely that it is! simple but beautiful.

hanne vedel had run spinderigaard, a spinnery, for many years and so i scored some lovely wool and silk cones. it's enough to make a lovely scarf or something. i love those greenish speckles. i got some with black speckles as well. 

 

so much weaving ahead!

1989 - now i have the right colors for this one

same for midnights - i like this color palette

the color palette for red

going to play with a so-called color effect for speak now

 the color palette for debut is probably the one that's most my vibe

i worked on these for five hours today, though that included cataloging all of the colors i have now, so i can keep track for future projects and orders.

i have so much exciting weaving ahead.

plus, they look pretty, just as decor!

these are part of the records i'm keeping.

so pretty, i can't wait to weave them.

yarn porn

i got my latest order of weaving yarn from kinna's today. ordering from them really tries my patience, as it takes them at least a week to even indicate that they've noticed one's order and then another week or so to send the invoice so you can pay it. why not actually have an online payment as if you're in the 21st century? but i digress. look at all this goodness! i think i can do most of the eras now, though i need to restock black, white and some grey because of TTPD, after running the reputation warp (again, more about that soon, i promise). i also got an idea, looking at this picture, for a warp that's cream and that hot pinkish orange color. but that's not really one of the eras, so i'll try to stay focused. or maybe i need another loom. 

i sorted it all into boxes, more or less in color families. that was weirdly soothing. and goodness knows i need some soothing, what with worrying about husband driving all over the place in ukraine, only 30km from the front. 

i'll be able to do another rainbow warp as well with all these colors. it seems everyone i've given some of those to wants more. 

these remind me of my old blue room! i'm looking forward to working with them. 

i'll play around on this long weekend (we have four days off!) with some of the colors, preparing some yarn windings for more of the eras. tomorrow, my friend and weaving teacher is coming over to help me get started on my more graphic warp. i'm trying to learn something new every time. i think what i mostly learn from the loom is patience! 

i couldn't resist the way the sunshine fell on this jar of yarn clippings i've been saving. i want to do a rather fiddly project with them, but i need enough of them. and maybe a bit more patience.

turning threads into fabric

i turned this... 

into this...

and all clipped apart, hemmed and finished, they look like this...

and here's a closer look at a few of my favorites...the first one, i'm keeping for myself from this batch.  

this has the classic look that karoline wanted.

i'm loving the madras plaid vibe of this one. i did a few variants of it.

i ordered up a bunch of new colors from a new source in sweden and i'm going to do some that are inspired by taylor swift eras. it will be a fun exercise in playing with color even more!

first batch of rainbow tea towels!

my first batch of tea towels is complete! they're so pretty and i was not at all done playing with color, so we made a new warp in the same color palette. 

i say we, because i am very fortunate to have my own personal weaving mentor, who gave me her loom and who is helping me every step of the way. 

to start off with, i played with some yarn i had in my stash - love the tweed effect of the nubbly yarn. i did enough to be able to make a little bag and now i've begun on the next set of tea towels. 

 

every single thread

we had an unexpected (for me, i've been busy lately, what can i say) day off midweek this week. i needed it more than i even knew. so i asked emmy if she had time to come and help me dress the loom (yes, i looked that up - i've learned weaving in danish, so i know none of the terminology in english). 

i'm really happy with the colors and the way this turned out. i can't wait to see what weaving in with different colors does to the whole. i'm hoping to learn a lot about how the colors affect one another.

some of the palette i've chosen for the weft. these colors are all in the warp itself. i have so much to learn.

i don't think i meant for this to be quite such a rainbow - i was playing with the color and the transitions between them and the process of moving from one side of the spectrum to the other. 

the threads are in such order, behaving themselves. there's so much potential for chaos within them (just two minutes with mazikeen the demon cat), but here, they are behaving and in order. and i can really see the color transition go from blue to yellow to red. there's some purple in both ends for balance. 

and now, i'm pulling the threads through (no idea what that's called), but this is essential to connecting them to the pedals and making a pattern. i have so much to learn. but what i love right now about this process is that i have to work with and develop a relationship with every single thread. i have to ensure that they are in the correct spot, checking and rechecking. i have to get to know them, to tame them. yes, they're going to be tea towels - an everyday object that gets used and isn't really noticed. but i will have noticed every single thread in them. that feels profound somehow. and it's so nice to be making something tangible, that i can touch and sense and feel and notice and ultimately use. and that isn't made up underneath it all of 0s and 1s.