April Weave-In

Our April meeting was held on a Saturday instead of the first Wednesday evening of the month.  We met at Gayle's home because, while she awaits the delivery of her new loom, she has enough space to set up five Schacht floor looms, the favorite of our guild members.  The sixth loom is an eight-shaft table loom.

This is the culmination of a year-long study of profile drafts, which we evaluated by breaking into interest groups according a style of weave, e.g., summer-and-winter. We've been trying to put a face on profile drafts and now we're putting what we've learned to work.  Each loom is warped for one of the weave structures and then everyone is invited to try the looms.  Sally is trying turned taqueté and liking it very much.

This loom is warped for an eight-shaft turned twill.  The idea is that each drawdown represents a profile draft. The lovely thing of Schacht looms is the little stick in the middle that holds the directions. This is Nancy's new loom that she just got and warped up for us today.

This direct tie-up Wolf Pup is warped for huck lace, which doesn't seem to lend itself readily to profile drafts.  It took a lot of attention from four seasoned weavers to finally get the correct treadling.  But collaboration is part of the fun in weaving.

Collaboration goes for loom maintenance as well.  Two looms needed a little mid-session tweaking.  It's good for the new weavers to see this kind of problem solving - a learning experience I'm sure they hadn't anticipated today.

The eight-shaft table loom was a collaborative effort too.  We decided that it takes three people to create a smooth weaving experience:  One throwing the shuttle, one to flip the levers on the top to raise the harnesses and one to read the draft to the one working the levers.  We took turns with this and instead of being a frustration, it was quite fun.

This Wolf Pup is warped for  summer-and-winter.  Nancy got the draft figured out and then walked me through a turn on it.  Most of the looms were warped in rayon so this one warped all in wool was a fun departure and I thought the stick shuttles were interesting too.

This was a four-hour program with a break for lunch and also for a guild meeting.  The rest of the time we milled around, sampling the different warps and the treats in the kitchen.

I am confident when I say - a good time was had by all.

Our Second Weaving Outreach

We were surprised to begin the afternoon with a group of girls and their moms, an arranged "play date."  One of the girls had come last year and loved it and now wanted to share it with her friends.  They instantly gravitated to the table we set up with cardboard looms and went right to work.

The moms gravitated to the station Nancy had set up to show the wide variety of things she has woven with a simple rigid heddle loom.  We hadn't anticipated having the library's entire meeting room area since last year we had just half of it and were all of us smushed into this space.  It was nice to have open and differentiated work areas.

It wasn't all just families and kids.  We did attract some adult interest too.  But what a difference it was from last year when the adults tried the looms and the kids were all about the cardboard looms  I keep wondering if the most beautiful Saturday this year played into this.  Our main audience was kids.

My loom was adopted by a group of girls.

Who left their shoes there when they went to try other looms.

I guess when we set out reach other weavers, we don't have an audience in mind - or maybe we do. We expect adults who are looking for an avenue of self expression.  We never dreamed our audience would be pre-adolescent girls who applied huge pressure on their moms to get looms.  One mom laughed when her daughter looked at her in all seriousness and said - do we have one of these at home?

Do You Want to Learn to Weave?

The Reno Fiber Guild was so pleased with our weaving outreach last March that we are going to do it again in partnership with the South Valleys Library  You are invited to come in to the South Valleys Library and try your hand at hand weaving.

 A variety of looms will be available to sample: 

Cardboard looms that teach the basics of tapestry weaving;
Floor and table looms that are used for weaving many items such as scarves, shawls, towels & rugs;
Inkle looms that weave narrow bands used for bookmarks, hatbands, belts, & guitar straps.
Rigid heddle loom: A small, light loom that can weave a variety of items.

This is one of the cardboard looms from last year - fun to weave and then take home.

 These small introductory looms were enthusiastically greeted, even by the boys.

Each loom will have a mentor to answer your questions and help you weave for yourself. 

All ages are welcome and you are encouraged to try any of the looms in the room.  If you have ever thought that weaving might be a good creative outlet, you're right.  In addition, the library display cases will contain handwoven items, books, fiber and weaving tools during the month of March.

Come to the South Valleys Library on Wedge Parkway, March 28th from 1:00-400 and try your hand at hand weaving.

Our Annual Christmas Party (Blocks, Blocks, Blocks)

 The Reno Fiber Guild has an unusual holiday tradition.  Each year, instead of a gift exchange, everyone brings something for a themed basket of goodies and raffle tickets are sold for the grand prize.   There is one lucky person who will take home everything in the basket.  The next year, the winner selects the theme for the next raffle basket (which is reused) and the whole thing repeats at a festive Christmas party.

This year, our past year's winner selected "blocks" as the theme.  It was a difficult challenge - but guild members rose to the occasion with a spectacular group of gifts.

Gloria was our winner this year and pulled out a lot of "block" weave items from her basket.  Won't this look lovely in Gloria's kitchen or bath!

And .....how about a glass "block" with lights for

Christmas decoration!

                        Or ...... a quilting "block" pot holder.

Tongue in cheek - Nevada Bar handmade soap

 

And a couple of scarves - handwoven blocks on the top and a recycled sweater "felted" scarf peeking from underneath.

 

It was a fabulous party with good food and friends in abundance.  Many thanks go to Lorene who has hosted this annual party several times in the recent past. 

 

Happy Holidays from the RFG! 

Iridescence Workshop

Our guild was so fortunate to have Bobbie Irwin present a two-day workshop this past weekend on how to weave the quality of iridescence into fabric.  She came loaded with information, samples and humor.

She mailed our warps in advance so that we could arrive with warped looms, ready to weave. Our colors were randomly assigned.  She assured us that each of us had won the color lottery.

We had no influence over the colors we received and she admonished us to not trade colors between each other or switch the color orders she provided in our instructions.

There were fourteen of us in the class and I'm pretty sure that none of had the same colors.

The thing that made this class so special was that it was fresh for everyone, seasoned weavers as well as the newbies.

And it was forgiving.  A newbie weaver from our summer intro class had some problems with the loom she checked out from the guild library, so a seasoned weaver stopped her own work to get the errors corrected and get the newbie back on track so she could have a good experience.

Kathy was our lone table loom weaver and while it may look clunky and slow, she whipped out her sample.  Bobbie told me that this she had never seen more floor looms in a workshop and certainly the most Schacht looms,all but three of us.

I had one of the different looms made by Dorset, no longer in business.  It was by far the lightest loom and perhaps one of the reasons it's no longer in business.  I kept having to pull it back to me.

The purpose of the workshop was to learn how to create color play between colors in warp and weft.  Perhaps you can see it in the block on right where you see both the yellow and purple. It is light dependent.

Bobbie had a nifty technique of adding tassels at the selvages with the weft colors.  I think that's far more effective than tags that never seem to make sense after the fact.

It's so hard to display the effect of iridescence in a still photo and I hope this sample shows a little of it.  We were wowed by Bobbie's samples and I think we were all challenged to take this information back to our own looms. I know I am.

September Meeting Kicks Off our Guild Year

The Reno Fiber Guild had their first meeting of the guild year on Sept. 3rd.  It was full of guild business, but there was also time for some spectacular "Show and Tell" and a "Make and Take" Christmas tree felted ornament. 

Nancy  wove and constructed this kimono.  The painted warp was 10/2 mercerized cotton sett at 24 epi.  At the shoulders, Nancy reversed the pattern so that the "feathers" would all point downward and she took advantage of the warp end to make a fringe detail on one of the sleeves.

Lorene was the winner of the "Little Luxuries" raffle basket at our May Christmas party!  Among the treasures was a skein of fluffy pink yarn which Lorene used as weft in this "luxury" scarf. 

 

Toni is the weaver of this tapestry.  Here is what she said about her piece.

 

"Sheila Hicks has been juried into several Biennials and is represented by a Gallery in New York, who displayed some of her work at the recent Art Basel in Miami, Florida last March. I find it inspiring that a fiber artist has reached the status of New York Galleries and a Paris address, and have always followed her work. I gasped when I saw the price tag on her small 8x12 inch  work entitled "Sweden" done in white and bits of blue; $10,000. and was inspired to weave my own interpretation"

 

And finally here is a sampling of the Christmas ornaments made under the supervision of Lorene and Victoria.

left - Lorene's ornament with rick rack border  center - Sharon's ornament and right is Suzanne's ornament.

 

Learning to Warp - Days 2 and 3.

Our last blog post showed our new weavers with their respective looms weaving away on their samplers.  The looms were taken home, the samples woven off - washed and prepared for "show and tell" at the next two day session in which weavers learned how to wind a warp and beam it on their looms.  Below is one of the samplers.  They were all spectacular; weavers showing us great promise for the future.





Our new weavers learned that warping is a skill unto itself. Making sure the threading cross is intact, counting the threads for the raddle - the whole nine yards!  Well, not nine yards for our weavers - just three this time.

 

 Mary tries her hand at warping with a reel.

 Then, there is separating the threads into their respective slots in the raddle. (Igor and Nancy are discussing the finer points of raddles and their function).










Getting the loom ready to accept the warp.  Jen, Lorene and Mary have everything well in hand here.

Threading the heddles.  Did we mention that this takes forever!  At the left, Mary is studying her options at the loom while Sheila winds her warp in the background.

Below you see Sarah intent on making sure her threading is done without errors!  A wise lady.



At the end of the second day, everyone was beamed on, threaded, the reed sleyed and the warp tied on to the breast beam. I believe Nancy is saying "I did it!"  Congratulations are certainly in order for all of our weavers.