Cacophony

Cacophony. Part of The Maharajah's Garden exhibition

Many travellers to the Indian subcontinent talk of being overwhelmed and left disoriented by the colours, sounds, smells when they first arrive.

I imagine a Garden full of exotic flowers and birds, fountains, gazebos and sunshine – so many wonders, so bright and beautiful, that all I can perceive is a blur of colour and light. Slowly my eyes refocus until I can see a single bloom.

ATASDA (The Australian Textile Arts and Surface Design Association) is launching a new exhibition soon – The Maharajah’s Garden. It’s a suitcase exhibition – a collection of textile art pieces, banners to decorate the venue, techniques boards, publicity material, white gloves for handling work etc, all fitting into one large suitcase (actually two suitcases, due to the amount of work submitted). Each suitcase will travel independently around Australia for the next two years, visiting schools and communities. Anyone can ask to host the exhibition – the only cost is postage to the next venue.

Banner section

ATASDA has had a couple of suitcase exhibitions in the past which were very successful. This is my first chance to participate and I was keen to make sure weaving was included – ATASDA members use a huge range of textile and surface design techniques. We were asked to respond to the theme The Maharajah’s Garden with rich, brilliantly coloured artworks.

Banner detail

Each suitcase will include 20 – 30 banner sections, each with ribbon ties so they can be used flexibly to decorate the different venues. I used an offcut from my main piece on my banner, with a flower shape based on the sequinned bloom on the hanging.

Some specifics:

Handwoven wallhanging, unlined, 47 x 40 cm.

Warp: 22/2 cottolin sett at 18 ends per inch.  I put out all the cones I had in “garden” colours and wound with 4 threads at a time. Each trip round the warping board I changed 1, sometimes 2, colours. When threading I chose fairly much at random from each group of 4 threads. I wanted a not-too-stripey “sunlight dappled” effect.

Threading and liftplan: rosepath (slightly more detailed explanation here).

Weft: mainly torn and cut strips of fabrics – organza, chiffon, lamé, silks and synthetics. I created big piles of torn pieces, then knotted them together in a semi-random order (that is, I picked up a piece at random and threw it back in the pile if I didn’t want it at that point).

I have some big cones of metallic thread (from a knitting machine supplier), and two colours of metallic were wound onto the shuttle together with the knotted fabric strips.

There are also sections using some of my mother’s embroidery threads. Plus there is a fine cotton thread used as a tabby (plain weave pick between each “fancy” pick). The hanging will do a lot of travelling over the next two years, and the tabby gives some needed stability and strength.

Weaving: I used the clasped weft technique throughout. Kaz of curiousweaver has a great video tutorial here. Most of the time I used a weft from each side, but here and there I used three at once – a shuttle from each side and a third yarn source in the middle (in the photo some of mum’s embroidery thread). Also in the photo you can see the shuttle of fine cotton for the tabby weft. Although the weft was knotted randomly I could juggle placement by seeing what was coming up and choosing my clasping points.

I don’t know the age of the sequinned and chain-stitch flower. It’s worked on a fine purple silk chiffon and was given to me a few years ago (by another ATASDA member).

A major part of the exhibition’s purpose is to enthuse viewers (school students and others) to go home and try a new technique using textiles and fibres. We were all asked to include an A3 techniques board, giving basic instructions in a technical skill. It would be great if someone decided to give weaving a go after seeing the exhibition, but there will be such variety and such strong work from others that cacophony could get lost in the general blaze of colour!

If you’re in Australia and would like one of the suitcases to visit your area, check the ATASDA website for contact information. They are already taking bookings and have venues pencilled in for every state.

Colour assignments 3 & 4

I’m continuing with the colour exercises, but have been thinking more about how these can be interpreted in weaving terms. The plain weave (or perhaps I should see them as blocks) I’m using on the assignments brings a lot of constraints.  Of course there’s surface design after weaving – a few well placed stitches or maybe experiment with patches.

I found a quote from Sharon Alderman, from a Weavezine podcast:

“…painters, if they want a little dot of crimson right there on the canvas, they just put it there. But if I don’t want it to appear in the warp direction and in the weft direction, I have to be ingenious to make it happen.

“And there are things that are different about weaving from others. Now, having said that, colour theory is colour theory no matter what your medium is, but the way that you handle getting the harmonies that you want is different for a weaver.

“The pointillists were trying to duplicate nature by making little dots of colour. Because when they looked at things closely, they saw the colours weren’t flat, that they were made of many, many colours.

“Well, that’s something that weavers can do better than anybody because if you use small threads you can have variety of colours and make a new colour by crossing one with another that is richer and seems to have more depth than what a painter can do.”

There’s another interview with Michael Rohde, which seems in my current state of mind to be all about colour.

I’d been thinking about the possibilities of double weave, then saw this piece by Elisabeth Hill. A few ends of a different colour has such an impact!

Is it wonderful or daunting, the way the world of weaving keep getting bigger?  Some days I just enjoy the wonder of it all, knowing I see and understand just a small part. Other days I focus down on my little corner and say “this is enough for me for now”.

Assignment 3 in David Hornung’s colour – a workshop for artists and designers is prismatic studies. “Prismatic” colours are high saturation, pure hues. I had mixed success.

prismatic, wide range of hue and value

Prismatic, narrow value range (high key)

Prismatic, narrow value range

Failed!! attempt at prismatic low key values

The major problem is the low-key violets. Dull, dull, dull! However not unexpected or unusual – in the book Hornung comments that mixed “pure” violets will always be disappointing. However, he recommends that despite this one should stick to mixing in the first four studies of the course. Ever obedient (hah!) I mixed, but have bought commercial violets and turquoise for the the later studies. The Lanaset dyes I use have particularly gorgeous violet and turquoise, and there’s no point learning about colour with that gaping hole.

Assignment 4 asks for Combined Saturation Studies.

Broad range of saturation, hues and values

On review I could have included something with stronger saturation.

Broad range of saturation and hue, narrow value range

Plus an extra for fun, since I often don’t like the studies I’m producing.

Broad range of saturation, hue and value

Previously:
Assignment 1
Assignment 2

Runner in rosepath

The first un-Christmas gift is done!

This is a table runner – more a centre-piece since it’s quite short – requested by my mother. Mum liked my autumn bag (blogged here) and asked for something similar. The colour cues are shown in the photo – on the left, a snap of the turkish rug mum picked up on her travels, on the right an offcut of her upholstery fabric.

I think this is the first time I’ve used yarn wrapping to help decide on warp colours and placement. In the end I thought the more formal, symmetrical style better reflected the formal layout of the rug.

This is the warp seen here, lying all smooth and ready to go onto the Robinson loom on New Year’s day. It was finally tied on and ready to start weaving 11 days later. The warp was short – just 1.25 metres since I only needed 62 cm finished length including fringe. I didn’t consciously take short cuts, but I kept finding myself doing stupid things and getting into a mess.  I kept thinking of it as a small warp, but it was 290 ends which is on the high side for me. Anyway, I fumbled through winding it on, then made multiple errors (and, I think, an equal number of corrections) while threading the heddles and sleying the reed.

Another shot, just because I like it!

With this type of weaving not everything is planned before you start – there’s of lot of decision-making on the spot as you see how colours work together. At first I found it really difficult, trying to second-guess what mum would like. One fabric in particular I really liked but she wasn’t keen on – it has orange and turquoise in it and is visible about half way up this shot, so you can tell that in the end I decided the only possibility was to do what looked right to me, and hope mum likes the final result.

Some project details: Warp is cottolin, sett at 18 ends per inch. Threading rosepath (thread 1, 2, 3, 4, 3, 2, 1 and repeat). Weft – varied, includes torn fabric strips (mostly light silk), some fancy silk yarns, some of mum’s old embroidery yarns, odd and bobs. Woven on Robinson 4 shaft table loom. Lift sequence 1-2, 2-3, 3-4, 4-1, 3-4, 2-3, 1-2, 1-4 and repeat. A few bits of clasped weft. Final size 62×39 cm.

Started 31/12/2009, finally finished 28/1/2010 (it was off the loom much earlier, but the finishing and fringes have been done in work pauses on the next project, which has a deadline I’m going to miss).

The one outstanding thing is mum’s reaction. I’ll see that next week.

Warp painting with Linda Coffill

Last week at the NSW Guild’s summer school I went to a great two day class with Linda Coffill, dyeing warps. It was excellent – great group of women, sufficient space to spread out our warps, hot outside (nice for drying) and cool inside, and most importantly a knowledgeable and generous teacher.

Linda talked to us about use of colour and flow – colour moving, changing, no harsh boundaries creating jerks and stopping movement. She brought along her enormous collection of Landscape dyes (being one part of Petlins,  Linda was able to bring along shop stock to supplement where necessary).

A great advantage of Landscape dyes in the class setting (and at home for those who choose, of course) is that all the auxiliary chemicals are already mixed in with the dye, so they are ready to use as soon as mixed with water (dyeing protein fibres only, such as wool and silk). Also they come in many, many colours (charts here), so we could concentrate on specific techniques with the warps rather than colour mixing.  (At home I’ll stick with Lanaset dyes – it’s not that hard to add the extra chemicals, and I’m a believer in mixing your own colours).

I’ve dyed yarns before, but never warps. Our first exercise was to wind a warp of 72 ends in 8 ply wool (suggested to keep things fast). Linda showed us how to lay out the warp, folding and positioning to create a balanced gradient on the scarf (ie both ends matching), allowing for loom waste etc. We could then dye a supplementary warp to use as an accent. There wasn’t time for weaving during the class – well, others managed it but not me . This was one of yesterday’s unfinished items, now completed and very pretty, if I say so myself.

I haven’t tried a supplementary warp before. The main warp was the wool, threaded for plain weave on shafts 1 and 2. I wound that on the back beam sett at 8 ends per inch, then through the heddles and reed leaving space for the supplementary weft – empty heddles on shafts 3 and 4 and matching gaps in the reed. The supplementary warp was tussah ribbon yarn from Beautiful Silks. I wrapped each silk end onto its own plastic bobbin, threaded through the waiting spaces, and weighted them in groups over the back beam with S hooks and washers. Weaving was simpler than I expected – lifting shafts 1 and 2 in turn for the plain weave base, and on each pick adding either shaft 3 or 4.

The colour pattern (using landscape names) was meant to be:
* wool warp starting heath, fading into dusk, fading into granite, then back through dusk into heath at the other end;
* supplementary silk warp starting at granite, fading into heath and back to granite;
* weft dusk throughout (slightly darker than in the warp).

I had some trouble at the beginning working with the very stretchy wool and the not-at-all stretchy silk, so the gradations didn’t quite match up as planned, but unless someone else starts obsessively folding and measuring the scarf noone will know!

The rest of my dyeing from class will need to wait in the weaving queue a while. Experiments 2 and 3 were “crampot dyeing” – the yarn scrunched around in minimal water in a pan and dye colours added to different regions. For the one on the left in the photo I also dyed yarn in a single colour for supplementary warp and weft. I have plans pencilled in for these, subject to change. To save time and do more dyeing in class I didn’t wind warps first, I just dyed whole hanks, so I should have plenty for whatever I end up doing.

The final warp involved a couple of hours of winding and tieing in complex groups. This will be a warp faced scarf, warp in 20/2 silk, weft (at the back in the photo) 60/2 silk. There will be 21 stripes in all, using 4 base colours (coral, pacific and tasman with a little granite) in various combinations. Linda’s examples were beautiful (drat me forgetting the camera both days!), so I have high hopes, but not expectations!

Surfacing and swedish lace review

I’ve been pulled hither and thither lately, have a number of nearly finished projects and the mess in my work area had gone from creatively releasing and exciting to mind numbing and confusing. So this morning I did enough tidying to let me work without constantly moving things around and the energy is already rising.

Today is Australia Day and we’re going to visit friends soon for the traditional barbecue, but I have a little pocket of time to answer some questions from Vivian about the swedish lace sampler blogged here.

Here’s a part of the threading, tie up and treadling. It was intended to create squares of pattern, but mine turned out rectangles. Just add as many pattern squares as you need for your piece.

Warp and weft are 22/2 cottolin, sett 16 ends per inch. I didn’t record the on-the-loom measurements, but got around 10% shrinkage between off-loom and finished. I suggest sampling yourself before undertaking a large project. The finished sampler is 34.5cm wide (about 13.5 inches), with 5 colour stripes. It’s a nice, light airy cloth. I’d like it as a scarf. I haven’t woven a lot of towels (just the summer and winter ones, which are very thick), so don’t know if this would be suitably absorbent and sturdy. Certainly the fringe I used would have to go!

I’ve used this sampler quite a bit when planning other pieces, especially the interaction of two colours and the impact of similar or very different values (lightness or darkness, which seems to be more important than hue – green, purple etc).

Vivian, I think towels in two colours would be lovely. I’m sure I’ve seen projects for tablecloths like that. Good luck with your project and weaving group.

Colour Assignment 2

Assignment 2 in David Hornung’s colour – a workshop for artists and designers
is muted colour studies. The first study should show a broad range of hue and value. The second study a broad range of hue and a narrow value range. Here are my attempts:

muted colours, broad range of hue and value

muted colours, wide range of hues, narrow range of values

muted colours, wide range of hues, narrow range of values

I’ve continued mixing and preparing colour swatches for the strips but still need to do lots more.  I decided to go to 6 strips wide and deep which means 12 different colours for each study. I didn’t have enough to really narrow the value ranges.

Previously: Assignment 1

A day in the life of my looms

Meg at Unravelling suggested photos of looms on new years day.

Robinson 4 shaft table loom with fresh and very short warp ready to go on.

Ashford 8 shaft table loom folded up and waiting patiently at the back of the noble.

Noble 24 shaft loom, with the end of the last scarf (huck bellringing) “saved” in case I decide to tie on another.

I hope the new year brings you  joy and fulfillment in your weaving and life

Weaving resolutions

Executive summary: lots of rambling thoughts about learning and goals, and a few photos of colour at the end. Not really general interest. Skim or skip as suits!

I don’t do new year resolutions. I actively and deliberately avoid them. And yet …

I’m emerging from a period of change and stress, am looking forward to more time and energy for textile pursuits, have a week off work, and “just naturally” started jotting down some ideas on where to focus next. Then I read this post from Sue at Life Looms Large. Drat and double drat! By random accident of the calendar (or so, still in denial, I tell myself), I have New Year’s Weaving Resolutions.

Maybe. I’m not totally convinced yet.

The question is, as a 2-and-a-bit year old weaver am I at a skimming the surface/general orientation/basic skill building stage? There’s an argument to deepen as well as widen skill and knowledge. I have a feeling of urgency and I can’t keep calling myself a beginner forever. I don’t want to be a dilettante, a dabler.

And yet… I’m not ready and I don’t want to specialise.  Yet. I’ve decided (provisionally) to aim at ongoing broad exploration and gradual deepening of a number of areas, but no intensive study and focus.

• Colour. I’ve restarted the exercises in colour – a workshop for artists and designers by David Hornung (first start was last October), with a slight variation to make it more weaving related.
• Weaving learning. Attempt a wide range of structures in continuing classes with Liz Calnan at the NSW Guild plus catchup samples on previous class work. No particular yarn focus, no exploring variations, just what is required to get a taste, an inkling of the possibilities.
• Other weaving. Some bits and pieces planned and some un-christmas presents (this christmas I asked what people might enjoy receiving before next christmas.)
• Reading. The Primary Structures of Fabrics by Irene Emery arrived in the post today. I have a habit of buying more books than I read and I think it will take some discipline – but this I want to read.

So overall, continued general skill building. I have a couple of other classes booked – in January 2 days with Linda Coffil dyeing painted warps, in April 5 days with Kay Faulkner “Imagery in woven fabric”. Apart from that I will allow myself to get distracted and sidetracked. Serious, systematic study and in-depth exploration will wait (sorry chenille).

These aren’t really new year plans because I’ve already started working through David Hornung’s book. The slight change mentioned above is that where the exercises specify “make a small gouache painting or painted-paper collage…” I’m attempting mini paper weavings.

Over the past few days I’ve had a lot of fun mixing paints and painting rectangles of paper in literally hundreds of colours. The photo shows a couple of rectangles where I tried to match colours of some cottolin yarn (the dark green is a better match in life than the photo shows). The paper weaving result is meant to simulate to some extent the visual effect of the actual weaving (swedish lace, blogged here). Not a good predictor of an actual outcome, but I think a technique useful for learning purposes. At some stage I might try scanning things in, then changing scale and copying to see if that looks any more fabric-like. Probably not – paint and paper is so flat.

These are assignment 1 – chromatic gray studies. The book categorises levels of saturation in a way I haven’t met before – prismatic colour, muted colour, chromatic gray, achromatic gray. I’m having difficulty with the muted colour | chromatic gray divide. I think I need to mix a heap more colours!

There are 16 assignments in all plus free studies, so one per week should take me until April. That’s if these New Year Resolutions (shudder!) last longer than most!

Chenille shibori

Silk chenille – woven, dyed, discharged.

This was hard to photograph because of the way it responds to the light. An intriguing cloth, and I’ll need to think a while about where to take it next.

Process overview:

Weaving: Silk chenille for warp and weft, sett 15 ends per inch. Monks belt threading on 4 shafts. The warp has block sizes of 6, 12 and 24 ends.

The chenille was woven in plain weave (blue weft in the draft). I wove floats in the monks belt pattern using a strong cotton thread as weft (red in the draft). I experimented with 6, 12 and 24 picks of chenille between each pick of cotton. For the second half of the sampler I only lifted one pattern shaft with the cotton, giving a mix of plain weave and floats.

Dyeing: Immersion dyed with Lanaset dyes, which dye protein but not cellulose fibres. This photo shows the varied spacing and the monks belt blocks of the cotton weft. The chenille was a rich chocolate brown and not as uneven as it appears in the photo – the cloth hadn’t been pressed after dyeing, and the light caught the texture. Simply adding colour made the cloth much more attractive than my earlier samples.

Gathering the cloth: The cotton wefts were used to gather the cloth into pleats. I pulled and knotted pairs of wefts, trying to make the gathering as tight as possible. The idea is that the next stage of the process mainly impacts on the exposed cloth, with the interior of the pleats  protected from change.

Discharge: Discharging removes dyed colour. I used thiourea dioxide (TUD) and a process from Shibori – creating color & texture on silk by Karren Brito (one of my favourite books, although it took some time for me to warm to it). TUD is pretty straight-forward to use, but you need to use protection including a proper respirator mask since a byproduct is stinky sulfur dioxide. I do it in the garage with doors and window wide open for ventilation – waiting for a good opportunity was the slowest part. First our next-door-neighbours were having a christmas gathering in their backyard (we have a good relationship and I’d prefer to keep it that way, not skunk out their guests!), the next day was too hot to move, then came rain…

Finishing:   Each end of the cloth had 20 picks of 20/2 silk. Straight off the loom I oversewed by machine using a three stitch zigzag (it takes 3 stitches to the left, then 3 to the right) using a silk sewing thread. I went over each end 3 times. The dye and discharge worked on all the different silks.

After discharging I handwashed, used fabric softener in the final rinse, and air dryed flat. I used a folded blanket to pad the ironing board surface, and pressed both sides. Although the result is big enough for a scarf I see it as a sampler and have simply cut the ends short at the machine stitching line, to see how it wears.

Result:

A few views of the results. There are areas of greater and lesser definition in the patterning. Where the gathers were widely spaced the discharge solution was able to penetrate more, more colour was removed and the effect is much softer. There was more difference on the two sides of the cloth than I expected.

At this point there are no worms. The fabric has gone through a lot of handling, so I’m hopeful there won’t be later problems. The fabric drapes well, but feels heavier than you expect. First impression is that it’s borderline for a scarf in Sydney’s climate. The hand (feel) still isn’t as soft as I’d like. I’m considering putting it through a machine wash and dry (once I’ve mustered enough courage!)

I did long overlaps of the yarn ends when changing bobbins. There’s no sign of worming, but there is a visible difference following the dyeing and discharge which I think no-one else would see. Still, I’ll try tieing the core-yarns next time.

Su Butler’s book-on-CD Understanding Rayon Chenille arrived today – a Sunday, from California to Sydney just 8 days from order to delivery, so impressive work by Village Spinning & Weaving and the US and Australian postal services! I’m looking forward to reading that while I ponder what to do next. I like what I’m getting so far, but I don’t feel I’m getting the best from this yarn yet.

Related posts:

29 November – first silk chenille samples

5 December – plan for second sampler

12 December – progress and general chenille information

Chenille progress

The story so far:

This post showed my first sampler using silk chenille as a warp, with a variety of wefts, sets and plain and twill weaves.

The next post outlined The Plan – woven shibori, plain weave chenille and monks belt pattern threads that will be used to gather the cloth during dyeing.

Progress to date: the cloth is woven and is in the dyepot as I type, becoming (I hope) a rich chocolate brown.

This project has been something of a lifeline to me the last couple of weeks. I’ve been worrying over things I can’t control, and whenever it all started feeling too much I’d distract myself by reading and speculating about chenille. (One major stress source resolved well during the week, so hopefully balance is returning).

A quick summary from internet research and my own musing, focused in particular on silk chenille yarn. BE WARNED!! Any or all of the following could be wrong, or not appropriate to whatever you are doing. This is my learning-in-progress, with no actual experience or depth of knowledge – as many questions as answers.

Still here?? “Chenille” is from the french for caterpillar – think fuzzy worm. It seems to be used for a few different-but-related things.

Twice-woven rugs – an initial weaving that is cut up between warp ends to produce shaggy long thin pieces that are used as weft in a second weaving. See Something New in Rugs, Atwater, Mary M. Weaver, Vol. 6 No. 4 (October-November 1941) available here.

Layers of fabric stitched and cut in channels to produce a shaggy look. Sample instructions here.

Confusion on the next one. When I was a child I had a “chenille bedspread”. I remember a plain woven fabric with a pattern of rows of tufts coming through the fabric. It wasn’t a separate yarn couched on top. Looking at photos on the web I’m wondering if it was actually candlewicking. Either way, it’s a red herring to my actual interest and final category…

Chenille yarn, showing separated pile and bare core yarns

Chenille yarn – short lengths of pile yarn held between two twisted core yarns. It’s the structure of the yarn which gives the name and the characteristic fuzzy worm appearance – and the troublesome twist. It can be made from all sorts of fibres. Rayon seems far and away the most common in handweaving but there’s also cotton, plus I’ve found references to linen, soy, acrylic, tencel and the one I’m working with, silk.

As well as the fibre content, chenille yarns can vary in length of pile, amount of twist, size of component yarns (core and pile), density of pile and I don’t know what else.

Twist, balance and worms. In spinning fibres are twisted together which provides strength, however the twisted yarn wants to unwind – there is yarn torque.  This is normally resolved by plying two yarns together, neutralising the twist forces and producing a balanced yarn. Try it – get a length of yarn or fibre and twist it tightly in one direction (clockwise or anti-clockwise).  Bring the two ends together, and the middle will want to twist up together.

Mostly we weave with balanced yarns that (we hope) sit nicely where we put them. Some forms of collapse weave deliberately use overtwisted yarns to cause movement and texture when the cloth is wet finished. With chenille the overtwist is used to hold in  the pile. If the overtwisted yarn isn’t held firmly in place little bits of it will want to twist up together. It can cause little “worms” bobbling up in the fabric, which could be regarded as unslightly. Anne Field covers it in her book collapse weave – Creating Three-Dimensional Cloth. With chenille, there’s an additional structural problem – release the twist, release the pile.

We need to keep the chenille and its twist firmly under control. Sett should be closer than you expect – consider the core yarns, not so much the fluffy pile. No long floats. One difficulty is that worms can appear over time – so how can I know piece A is successful before I start on piece B? Maybe carry it around lots and generally abuse it, to simulate a year’s wear in a week or two?

I’ve read in a couple of places that pile direction is significant. I don’t understand that. It seems to me that as we wind the warp it goes up then down, and as we weave the picks they go first left then right. So I guess I’ve missed something.

Cutting fabric has also been mentioned as a problem. Could this be all those new yarn ends, no longer firmly contained? Perhaps something like intense stay stitching would help.

For fringes, firm braiding or twisting with a knot seem the most common. Use of fray check has been suggested – I don’t know if that would cause a distracting hardness. In my current experiment I didn’t want a fringe, so I’ve machine stitched across each end multiple times. I’ll let you know how that goes.

I’ve  read that rayon chenille stretches a lot, especially when wet. Would that be related to the fibre (so not a concern for my silk), or the high twist which stretches out under weight (eg of the water)? I found when tying on to the front beam that the chenille stretched and in one case snapped. Maybe that’s related. I did find a comment on the strength-to-bulk relationship, but no detail.

When working with the warp, since ends were determined to twist and I didn’t have enough hands for everything, things seemed to go better when I made groups of ends twist together in a bulky, gentle way, instead of individual craziness.

Joins. An industrial reference suggests either a core knot (strip back the pile of the ends, tie a double square knot) or a splice (overlap ends and wrap). In my current piece I had an extended overlap and beat especially hard – will see over time how well that holds.

Next step is to finish and evaluate the current experiment, but I’m considering later possibilities:

• Some combination of the chenille with the ixchel cashmere/merino (used here in my collapse weave scarf). I’m thinking the ixchel (felts/fulls incredibly) would stabilise the chenille and prevent any movement or worms. It could get a bit heavy though if there’s a collapse effect.

• Surface design anchors – lots of decorative machine stitching, or maybe couching fancy threads or fabric strips. Again the idea would be to restrict movement of the chenille.

• Diversified plain weave, which would keep the chenille tied down. (Link to my sampler here). It would be interesting to use a cellulose fibre (maybe rayon or cotton) with the silk chenille, then dye the finished cloth. Only the silk would take up the dye (using acid dyes).

• Worms are mainly a problem in something used. Maybe a wall hanging could exploit them visually.

Resources

As I said at the beginning, don’t simply accept what I’ve written – I’m at the beginning of the learning curve. Other places to try:

Su Butler – definitely at the top, top, top end of the learning curve. (I have her book-on-CD on order).
YarnsPlus top ten tips
Weavezine – do a search, but this particular link describes something very similar to what I’m trying (only I read it after I started, so couldn’t incorporate any learning).
Weavolution has a rayon chenille group. (You have to join up first)
Weavetech – I searched back through the archive and found some interesting stuff. (another thing to join)
Information from CIMA – gets kind of technical. I skimmed.

A Study of the Basic Parameters Describing the Structure of Chenille Yarns by Erhan Kenan Çeven and Özcan Özdemir.   Again way technical, but I liked the pictures on the first page! There are lots of other technical papers out there – I tripped over a few CSIRO things – but they’re focused on industrial considerations and hugely over my head.

Comments always welcome – especially for all the bits I’ve got wrong

J