Coloured Heddles

In order not to confuse myself when drawing the heddles on my table loom, I decided to colour them. This should have been easy, after all, the texsolve heddles are white threads, however, they are made of polyester. Polyester is not easy to dye, it requires the more complex method of using disperse dyes.

After much thought, I decided to use watered down acrylic paint. I used a ratio of, 2 tablespoons of paint to one cup of warm water. I dipped the bundles of heddles into the "dye", let them sit for a few minutes, and then laid them flat to dry overnight.

The results are perfect, they are now coloured heddles, that are very, very slightly stiff, but not much, and they look quite pretty!

Please excuse the picture, I used my phone camera, and it looks awful! The camera certainly needs some sort of setting adjustment.

Weaving: A Beginning

I have always wanted to weave. I have been to weaving villages in India, and have been in awe by the process of interlacement of warp and weft, so simple and yet sheer magic! All those thousands of threads, produce these absolutely gorgeous fabrics.

Weaving has been all around me throughout my life in India. We had handwoven fabrics everywhere. All of my saris are handwoven or hand loomed, as we call it, and I just love them!! I also wear a lot of Khadi, to me Khadi has special meaning, it the fabric of freedom, beauty, simplicity and gave us Indians back, our sense of self worth, in a small but very meaningful way. I associate Khadi, spinning and weaving with Gandhi, one of my heroes.

I tried weaving about 7 years ago, at the Museum for Textiles, here in Toronto, but didn't really do much about it. However, last year, I began looking at learning to weave again, and came across the Ashford knitters loom, I thought of getting one and began doing some reading, the more I read, the more absorbed I became with the whole world of looms, shuttles and treadles! It's such a huge and fascinating subject. The Internet, as usual, has proven to be invaluable in obtaining all kinds of weaving information.

As luck would have it, I was presented with an Ashford 32", four shaft table loom with stand and treadles. You can't imagine how thrilled I was!!

I put the loom together last month, and so far have done three projects, two were samples, with the third one being my "real" project. It was supposed to be a scarf, but I am calling it a table runner (it's too heavy for a scarf).

There is of course, lots to learn with hours of practice needed to be a good weaver. However, it's not as difficult or scary as I thought it would be (or as many people make it out to be), it's a process like any other, which requires time, attention and oodles of patience.
It's not knitting or sewing, they are related to each other on some level, but are completely different processes. Weaving is a whole different world and presents itself, in a rather unique way. Having said this, I find it very similar to machine knitting, for example, pushing the shuttle through the shed, is much like moving the carriage back and forth.

As to my experience with weaving? I love it to bits, it's meditation in motion! One sits, moving these threads, and the result is pure fascination and magic. I have begun this journey, which I hope will be a lifelong one, I belong to it, and I am so glad to be part of it.