As part of the Rocky Mountain Weaver’s Guild study group, I’m learning about tied weaves. First project was to look at Summer and Winter. I needed to better understand “blocks” and profile drafts first, so I embarked on this the hard way. I sketched out a design on graph paper and attempted to convert it to a profile draft and then to summer and winter (using Fiberworks Weaving software).
My first sketch was too large, I’m a knitter so size really is not a restriction and I’ve sketched out graph patterns before (I’ve made a Turkey-Canada blanket shown here on Ravelry). But the key thing of a profile draft, is your limited to pattern blocks. And when it comes to summer and winter, the number of pattern blocks you can have is limited by the number of shafts you have available. I have an 8 shaft loom currently, so I tried out some ideas hoping for 6 pattern blocks.
My first idea was to do something around hemp and Henry VIII (who built a navy using hemp). So I was going to use castles and ships. Well, to do castles and ships “well”, you really need about 10 pattern blocks available, so a 12 shaft loom. I discarded that and went to a simpler skull and bones pattern next, which I can (sorta) do on my 8 shaft.
But the original idea was resurrected when my old weaving teacher Pamela offered up her 12 shaft Leclerc Voyageur for rent at the WHAC to test a pattern on. The profile draft was born with the option added to flip it if I just do it as a border (weaving on a table loom is slow, so I may not do the whole scarf with the pattern):
I’ve tied on at the WHAC and will start weaving this coming week. Pics to follow. We’ll see how this one turns out. The warp is a Louet Linen in laceweight and the pattern weft will be a pewter Zephyr I bought for a shawl for my aunt, but didn’t use. The only remaining question is whether or not I’ll double the Zephyr for the pattern weft (most likely) and whether or not I’ll be ambitious and weave the entire scarf with the pattern. We’ll see how fast it weaves up.