So little time...

 How's this for a cool little gadget? I bought it recently for a few dollars to have as a decoration. It is from an old ribbon weaving loom. The wooden box or base was mounted vertically on the front of a giant loom, with the thread feeding out the hole in the top of the handle. The base of the shuttle is notched and a cog wheel adjusts the angle of the shuttle on the base. As I hold the smooth, worn handle, I wonder about how many miles of ribbon were woven.

 I have been remiss at photographing completed projects (as all my friends are informing me) so I am going to try to catch up. But as you all know I would rather be crafting....

Above is a piece that came off the loom last night. Blue cotton warp, with alternating bright green and sage green weft segments. It is a balanced twill pattern. I had two crossed threads at the start and one warp thread broke midway into the weaving. Both are easy fixes.

Detail of the twill above. The warp is running left-right. This piece will wind up being a baby sling. It was a bit dark in the room when I photographed this. It is really blue and green.


This pink cloth is the cotton and rayon girlie version of the baby sling. I have this one all finished up and with the rings sewn in place. (why baby slings? Because they are simple rectangles).

Stay tuned for photos of baby slings in action!

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Medico Loom by Leclerc

Image
Here's the newest addition to my Painted Floor Studio. This is a Medico table loom, manufactured by Leclerc, a Canadian company. Research suggests this loom was manufactured for WWII veterans to use. As such it utilizes hand levers for changing the shed. But as you can clearly see in this picture, I have the floor stand which includes six treadles, essentially making it a floor loom.  The maximum weaving width is 22 inches. When I bought this loom last week it came with the blue and white warp on there already. I decided to just play with it, getting the hang of the levers and treadles. I figured out how the previous owner had the tie-ups done, and then "went with it."  Altogether I wound up with a piece of fabric about ten feet long. I will either cut it into bits and sew small bags out of it, or maybe use most of it for a scarf. In this photo you can see the four hand levers (silver) in the top right corner of the loom. In the top centre area of the loom
Read more

What's old is new again

Image
Recently the talk of the Fiber Prep group on Ravelry is about "blending boards". It's like a drum carder, but without the drum. A flat surface covered in carding cloth. During the same week this was impressing many on Ravelry, hubby and I were in a thrift store where he spotted this! Naturally it had to come with me. (This model is not the same as what the current buzz is about.) So it is a heavy wooden box construction, with a separate handle that also has carding cloth on it. The manufacturer is Louet, a good name in spinning circles. A little vacuuming to clean out the remains from the previous owner and I was ready to roll. Here is the end on view, so you can see how the two sets of tines are proximal to one another. The batts in the back ground came off of an Ashford drum carder. And here is a view of the pegs on the handle which help to guide you in a straight path and you sweep away from yourself. In this image you can just see two wool locks
Read more

Ulla Cyrus Loom

Image
Get a look at what followed me home recently! I have gleefully adopted " Courage "  - my new addition to the family. WELCOME. The original owner of this loom was William Dyer, a famous weaver who lived in California and Washington State. He made very fine damasks with this loom.   A very large loom manufactured by Oxaback in Sweden. The model is called "Ulla Cyrus". It is a vertical countermarch with 16 shafts and 18 treadles. Plus it has the additional, optional unit draw and pattern shaft draw. Two different drawloom attachments. The weaving width is 63 inches.  I picked up this beauty in the north part of Texas, and the loom was already disassembled. This photo shows just a fraction of the gear. It was great fun to meet the current owner. Here we have returned home and both the box of the truck and the 5 x 12  landscape trailer are entirely filled with loom pieces. Completely. It is a lot of gear. And this is a glimpse at a small porti
Read more