In September 2013, I made a felt hat for a friend. The hat is based on styles worn by turkic tribes in near Asia for several thousand years, with a crown similar to “Phrygian caps” with the back and sides worn long. I’ve collected a few images on this pinterest board.
How would you like to know what’s on my loom right now? August was an insanely busy month for me both professionally and personally. My focus was simply surviving and trying not to drop too many balls. Sadly, the big floor loom was naked for all of that month. An air of reproachfulness emanated from the loom room as she doesn’t like being undressed. Good thing that room has a door that can be closed. But,…
The Iron Age Finnish Mantle project, completed in July 2013, was a wonderful opportunity to learn a variety of new-to-me textile techniques. One of those new experiences was creating table woven bands integrated with the body of the mantle. These bands served a dual purpose in that they were both decorative and functional, keeping the cloth from raveling.
The Finnish mantle warp is on the loom and I’m ready to start weaving! Here are all the details on that process or you can skip over that part and go straight for the weaving eye candy as I have a largish gallery of photos documenting the process.
In my last post, I introduced you to my latest project, weaving a shawl inspired by an iron age Finnish mantle. Now that you have the background, its time to get down to some specifics. I am making changes to size, color, and fiber content, as well as making guesses to some of the construction details where they are not known. If I was hard core, I would be doing this on a warp weighted…
I am starting a new project with a hard deadline of the third weekend in July. This project, an iron-age Finnish mantle, combines cloth weaving, tablet weaving and coiled wire work. I fully expect the next six weeks to be filled with insanity, frustration, ah-ha moments and, hopefully, joyous triumph. I’m looking forward to it!
This weekend I wet-finished and hemmed the blue/yellow leg wraps I had recently taken off the loom. Very pleased with how they look.
Its been four months since I finished the cloth for the Rus kaftan and, this past Sunday, I finally made time to beam a new weaving project on my floor loom – a pair of leg wraps (wicklebanders or winningas) in dark blue and yellow for a viking reenactor friend.
In January of 2013, I decided to branch out from my usual early period research and crafts. I have several friends who do Landknecht really well and I though it would be interesting to give it a shot.
Several years ago, a friend taught me to naalbind using what is commonly known as the mammen stitch. Naalbinding is an ancient needle looping technique that predates knitting for string manipulation. It was used in the Viking age, but also dates to ancient Egypt, I believe.
