Weaving wonders

We had some really good weaving ideas this week. Top is the woven phone pouch Peter made and his wife, Marina, sewed it all together. He also has a matching one for his glasses. In was done on an inkle loom. Bottom left is the dog collar Marina made on her inkle loom and it looks so good and is such a good idea. She has to make another one for the other family dog! So good to be able to make the things you actually need. The dog collar is on top of a lovely woven pillow made from upcycled tablecloths and sheets. In real life it looks really nice and would be a great addition to any chair. Upcycling old clothing and manchester is a great way to get bags , cushions and mats and they are stylish items. Woven fabric has a cool look about it. It is strong and durable too. Bottom right is the tabletop sprang loom John made for Christine out of upcycled  wood. We like to make use of everything and we all have stashes of bits which can be upcycled into something we need. The tabletop loom means Christine can sit comfortably to do her sprang weaving. The bonus is we can see better what she is doing and so it raises our level of interest and involvement in what Christine is doing. Living proof you can just use what is around you to make lovely things. 

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Woven bark fibre

While some are drowning the world  in plastic and we are trying to find ways of cleaning it from our rivers and oceans because it is contaminating the environment , there are other people on the other end of the scale who are very passionate about rediscovering sustainable living. We are not all going to be sitting on the forest floor stripping bark and weaving it. We just aren’t. What we’ll do , though, is watch something like this and know for a fact that we can do better and we can get back to living in a way which will stop piling trash of all sorts of descriptions all over our home. It’s actually fascinating to watch this man weave bark. We have a lot of gum tree bark which peels of the trees here. Maybe we could put it to better use?

We thank Marina for sharing this video link with us.

Spinning cotton

A while back , Hilary brought in a bulk purchase of cotton to spin and we could buy it a tiny prices. Marina had decided to spin hers and she found out it spins far better on a bigger, older wheel than on a small wheel. You need a strong pull on the fibre to get the cotton to spin nicely, so a wheel where you have a good chance of changing ratios and tension. The dyed cotton wasn’t actually something we thought looked particularly good but now we have seen it spun up it looks great and can be plied with itself or some silk and makes a really nice yarn. If you don’t try things, you don’t know. Looking at it tells you nothing. Cotton is good for bags, tops and wash cloths. It is totally sustainable and cotton growers are getting smarter at using less water. As a plant based fibre it is easily composted. As a lightweight, breathable fibre it is good to wear next to your skin so learning to spin cotton gives you more yarn choices for projects. Some people are allergic to wool.

Rose Fibre

Rose fibre is obviously celullose based. It is one of the plant fibres which is becoming increasingly popular , partly because people are experimenting with unusual fibres and partly because vegans do not want to use animal based fibres. It is completely sustainable and eco-friendly. It can be mixed in with other fibres to increase the drape of the knitted, felted or crocheted fabric. If you are going to dye it, you need to ensure you are using a dye suitable for cellulose based fibres. It’s easy to spin but if you watch the video you can see how the woman pulls the fibres apart and loosens them before she spins them. It adds sheen and shine. We are all looking forward to using our rose fibre which we have bought this year but haven’t yet worked out how we are going to use it. Are we going to spin it separately , as this woman has, or are we going to mix it in with other fibres? Rose fibre is regenerated and similar to bamboo. The plats are broken down to the cellulose and the fibre is made from that. Different from cotton which is produced directly from the plant.