Weaving for Your Home
By: Melissa Ludden Hankens / June 2010
I am writing this from the kitchen of my new home. My husband and I purchased what can only be called a labor of love back in January. It’s a mid-18th century saltbox that has been haphazardly renovated over the years, most recently a half century ago, and greatly needed someone to bring a bit of life back into its old walls. We have spent evenings and weekends making slow progress toward this goal, and have finally moved in. We still have a long way to go until it looks like the house we envision, but for now we’re happy living within the walls of this work-in-progress.
Of course this leads me to weaving. The house has inspired an interest in the history of weaving and weavers in Colonial America. Over the holidays I treated myself to a copy of The Coverlet Book Early American Handwoven Coverlets by Helene Bress. There is a wonderful review of this book on WeaveZine that you can read here (http://weavezine.com/reviews/coverlet-book). I plan to delve a bit more into overshot in the coming months, a weave structure that has always intrigued me, but rarely found its way onto or my loom. I wrote about my very first overshot experience here (http://www.schachtspindle.com/blog/2008/04/
confessions-of-novice-weaver-final-week.html). My floats were longer than the “rules” might like, but as you know, I tend to think, “rules shmools”.
Period textiles aside, I have been dreaming of weaving curtains for every window in the house, or at least most of them. I’ll weave new table linens and hand towels and rugs and runners. Our home will be a showcase of weaving! An extravaganza of weaving! Weaving here, weaving there, weaving, weaving everywhere! But where to begin?
I decided to start with the bathroom. This was the first room we tackled as part of our renovation project, and naturally a place where one appreciates a bit of privacy (especially when one’s neighbor lives about 30 feet away). Off to peruse the stash!
I had acquired a large cone of cottolin; the label called the color pecan and was exactly the sort of natural color I was looking to use. The color is lovely, but I’m not sure it is entirely accurate choice of a color name, which seems to be a bit less brown than an actual pecan.
I think that cottolin is a wonderful material to use in weaving. It has a bit of the aesthetic qualities of linen along with the somewhat more forgiving nature of cotton all rolled into one. If you are interested in weaving with linen, but want an interim step to warm you up, cottolin is an excellent choice. This particular cottolin, from Phoenix Dye Works, has a thick and thin quality
about it that I like. It gives the finished fabric a slightly more rustic look that fits perfectly with our square little home.
This project, which I wove on my 20” Flip rigid heddle loom using two 8-dent rigid heddles, was woven in three sittings: one to warp and two to weave. I was amazed at how quickly it all came together, even with the slightly finer sett. Don’t let the size of a project intimidate you. Curtains might seem like a big undertaking, but in reality can be a quick and easy project.
On a side note, my friend Tracey gave me a great suggestion. When she finishes up a weaving project, she makes a note in her project notebook (you are keeping a project notebook, right?) of what she would do differently if she were to weave the same project again. I thought this was a brilliant idea. How often are you mostly satisfied, but not 100% satisfied with what you have woven? Or maybe you have a flash of inspiration mid-project. Don’t let those ideas disappear. After finishing this project, I have decided to take out the machine stitching I used to create the hems and re-stitch them by hand for a more invisible and handmade finish. Thanks Tracey!
When making curtains, the first thing you should do is measure your windows. From there you need to decide if you want a single panel or a pair of panels, how you want them to look when hanging, and how much of the window you want to cover.
Here is my example. My bathroom window measures 24” wide x 48” high. I am planning to hang a blind to cover the entire window overnight, but wanted a bit of privacy during the day without blocking out all of the wonderful sunlight we get in