Project 9 - Stage 2 - Woven Structures

I feel, perhaps, like I might've cheated a bit here.  I was all set to start building my own tapestry loom when all of a sudden I found a vintage toy loom in a charity shop for £5.  I felt it was meant to be there, just waiting for me and I just couldn't pass it up, also it ended up saving me quite a bit of money I think, it also came with a knitting dolly and a beading loom, which looks very complex but should at least keep my kids quiet for a bit while I work.  Another plus is that this toy loom has a heddle which seems unusual in toy looms from what I've seen, and that is a massive time saver.

My Mum had been in Edinburgh over the Summer and sent me some beautiful postcards from the Dovecot Studio which I have been drooling over and using as inspiration in lieu of making it up there myself.  Also in the way of research I got a lovely little book called 'Weaving - Methods, Patterns and Traditions of an Ancient Art' which although very tiny contains a wealth of information.  In my local library I found a couple of weaving books which set me up well to start experimenting.

There was a bit of a gap between finding my loom and getting hold of some weaving books and me being me I decided to just bash on and have a go, it didn't turn out too badly but I had no real idea about what to do with the ends or how to add in new colours, because of this my first piece is a bit rough around the edges, but I am really pleased with how it turned out.  The first weaving I did was based on one of the wool wrapping, colour analysis exercises from the previous project.  It was based on a photo of the Highlands at sunset and I think the weaving is a pretty good representative of that.

For my next attempt I decided to start over and follow the instructions properly and work in black and white to try out all the different techniques form the course literature., focusing on the effects rather than the colours.  From top to bottom of the weaving I tried - plain weave, focussing on keeping the tension at the sides correct, curved wefts, soumak, ghiordes knots and then plain blocks with splits.