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November 29 2022, newsletter

Units, Blocks & Profiles – What a year!

None of us can believe that another year has flown by and we are getting ready to launch Season 7, the sequel to Units, Blocks and Profiles. We have covered so much ground and given you so much to absorb but…that’s the beauty of the School of Weaving format. I know that many of my students who have taken “in-house” workshops in the past are delighted that they can now go through everything we learned this year, at a pace that gives them time to absorb all the information.

We started our first project of the year with a bang by taking 8-shaft Twill to another level by playing with blocks and tie-up quadrants. We watched the magic happen! We took what we learned about Monk’s Belt and pushed it up a notch. We learned how to use the unit system for Overshot and how to adapt our designs using Twill shapes in the mix. We learned how to do name drafting, which is so much fun. We finally got to know and play with Crackle Weave, learning how to add layers to this eye-popping structure. Next came M’s & O’s with all the treadling elements you could incorporate in the structure to create a beautiful cloth. We took our first steps into the almost endless possibilities of weaving using Summer and Winter. Before we knew it – we were blowing our minds learning to analyze blocks and then weaving the fabulous Block Analysis/Bronson Lace scarves.

Now it’s time to just enjoy the holiday season and weave with all the knowledge you’ve gained this past year!
Thank you for coming on this journey with me : )
Jane


School of Weaving In-Stock Kits

8 Shaft Twill Block & Tie-up Quadrants

Level of Difficulty: intermediate
Weave structure: Twill Blocks & Tie-up Quadrants
Material: 8/2 cotton
Each kit makes: 12 Tea Towels

Things we learn:

  • ways to manipulate the tie-up box
  • we consider it in quadrants
  • how to frame Lace with Twill
  • how to frame Basket Weave with Twill
  • how to frame Plain Weave with Twill
  • we don’t fret about clean cut lines
  • how to play with graphic and colour.

Monk’s Belt

Level of Difficulty: Intermediate
Weave structure: Monk’s belt
Material: 8/2 cotton & 8/4 cotton
Each kit makes: 12 Placemats

Things we learn:

  • Monk’s Belt uses 2 opposite twill units. A is 1&2 and B is 3&4
  • the number of times a unit is repeated lengthens the pattern float
  • the number of times a unit can be repeated is also dependent on the EPI of the warp
  • it is woven with alternating tabby picks between pattern picks
  • it can be woven on other threadings ie. point twill for a 3-end unit and Huck for a 5-end unit.

Overshot

Level of Difficulty: Intermediate
Weave structure: Overshot
Material: 8/2 cotton
Each kit makes a warp for 3 Scarves

Things we learn:

  • the unit system for Overshot
  • how understanding Twill shapes will help us identify those shapes in Overshot
  • Tromp as Writ, Rose Fashion, treadling on opposites
  • using contemporary graphics in the threading
  • adding other Plain Weave elements to the overall design.


Crackle Weave

Level of Difficulty: Intermediate
Weave structure: Crackle Weave
Material: 8/2 & 8/4 cotton
Each kit makes: 9 Towels


Things we learn:

     • Crackle weave is a twill-derivative structure
     • it can be woven with or without alternating tabby picks
     • how to interpret a Twill threading as a profile draft
     • doubling the units to double the size of the pattern
     • Overshot style treadling
     • on opposites treadling
     • classic Crackle threading, 3 wefts, (no tabby)
     • Bronson Lace treadling
     • Summer and Winter treadling
     • composition of graphic.


M’s & O’s

Level of Difficulty: Intermediate
Weave structure: M’s & O’s
Material: 8/2 organic cotton & 8/4 cotton
Each kit makes: 12 guest towels or 12 placemats


Things we learn:

  • traditional threading for M’s & O’s
  • that we can thread Plain Weave selvedges and we can weave a version of Plain Weave selvedge… BUT, not both… you have to pick which one you want.
  • if you go for the version of Plain Weave we can use floating selvedges to spiff up the selvedge (we are using 4 per side)
  • that we have 2 units that can be repeated with care… I’ll explain in the video
  • that we can treadle: almost Plain Weave, traditional M’s & O’s, honeycomb, a version of Monk’s Belt, a version of Bronson Lace & repetitive sequences playing with all those things.

Summer and Winter

Level of Difficulty: Intermediate
Weave structure: Summer & Winter
Material: 8/2 cotton
Each kit makes: 1 sampler and 8 placemats

Things we learn:

  • the unit system of Summer and Winter
  • what a two-tie structure means
  • how to make your hem exactly like the pattern in reverse
  • how to treadle in pairs X style
  • how to treadle in pars O style
  • how to treadle in singles alternate style (bricks)
  • how to treadle in Dukagang style (columns)
  • how to change your ground patterning by changing your tabbies
  • having neutral warp allows us to bring in any colour we want.

School of Weaving

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JST 2023 Calendar

You now have the option to have the calendar shipped letter-mail to save on shipping. These images will inspire you all year long. Why not give them to your favourite weaving friends 🙂

$5 to ship in Canada and $7 CAD to ship to the USA.
Just click the “letter-mail” shipping option at checkout.


From Our Inbox

We were delighted to see Jacqueline Hitchen’s beautiful sample towels using what she learned in Season 6 – Episode 6 – Crackle Weave. Jacqueline wove them with Overshot and Summer & Winter treadling and we were pleased to see her results woven in her own choice of colours.


We offer FREE shipping on all Louet looms within Continental North America. We also offer the option to pay a $1000.00 CAD deposit on your loom with the balance due when the loom ships out to you. This gives you the flexibility to make smaller payments toward your balance, at your convenience.


Here to Help

Have a weaving question? Find us on the Jane Stafford School of Weaving Forum

and on Weave with Jane Stafford on Ravelry.

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The Lace Weaves are coming in 2021!

Hi Kids,

Before I turn your weaving world towards laces, I really want to say thank you to all of you who have supported my dream of being able to reach out to more weavers than I could ever fit in my Studio. Some of you stepped into my world at the very first episode and others have joined us along the way. Every one of you has helped me continue my love of teaching and I thank you all from the bottom of my heart. I hope the episodes have brought some focus and relief during this extremely difficult year.

And now it’s that time of year again….time for a wee snippet detailing our programme for 2021. I’ve spent the last 6 months preparing for our upcoming season on Lace and we have the first 5 episodes completed. Once again, I worked with my Dream Team who wove spectacular examples of the ideas presented in the episodes. The Show and Tells are incredible this year.

Before we dive into Lace we will do one more episode on Twills….I just had to tell you about Turned Twill which is one of my favourite weave structures. Then we’ll tackle Canvas Weave, Huck, Huck with Colour and Weave effects, Bronson Spot, Atwater Bronson Lace, Blended Lace and how we can get Lace and Twills all in one piece.

I hope you enjoy our little trailer,

Stay Safe kids.
Sending tons of love,
Jane


Laces

a study of cloth with holes


Season 5 2021 Release Dates & Yarn List


Episode 1 –  Turned Twill, January 21 – Yarn: 7 cones of 8/2 cotton: 3 cones of Taupe, 2 cones of Gold, 1 cone of Red and one cone of White/Bleached.  (12 towels) Jane also used lots of bobbins from her 8/2 stash 

Episode 2 – Canvas Weave, February 25 – Yarn: 2 x 250 gram cones of 16/2 Venne Organic Linen in White, 1 x 100 gram cone of 16/2 Venne Organic Linen in Light Stone Grey (long sample or runner)

Episode 3 – Huck, April 1 – Yarn: 400 grams of Bambu 7 in Periwinkle (samples and a scarf)

Episode 4 – Huck Colour & Weave, May 6 – Yarn: 5 cones of 8/2 cotton, 2 Black, 2 White/Bleached and 1 Pale Limette (6 gamps)

Episode 5 – Swedish Lace, June 10 – Yarn: 2 cones of 8/4 cotton in Nile Green and 1 cone of 8/4 cotton in Denim (long sampler or runner)

Episode 6 – Bronson Spot, July 15 Yarn: TBA

Episode 7 – Atwater Bronson Lace, August 19 Yarn: TBA

Episode 8 – Blended Lace, September 22 Yarn: TBA

Episode 9 – Huck & Twills, October 28 Yarn: TBA

Episode 10 – Lace Grande Finale, November 18 

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JST Blog June Weaver Spotlight!

Hi kids,

This month I’m happy to introduce you to another member of our Online Guild – Arlene Kohut. Arlene is a wonderful weaver who enjoys the design possibilities of layering elements into the fabric that she weaves. You may recall Season 2’s episode on Stripes where I showed you 2 tea towels that Arlene designed layering striping and Bronson Lace. In this blog post she takes us on her journey exploring this season’s Twills on 4’s Simple Two Stripe sample.

If you would like to see more of Arlene’s weaving, you can follow her on Instagram @inkohootsweaving.


My name is Arlene Kohut. I live in Victoria, British Columbia. I started weaving 10+ years ago after my son’s Grade three teacher brought a rigid heddle loom to class for the students to weave a class project. I was able to weave a couple of inches since I was a class parent helper. Once I realized that cloth could be created from fibre woven on a loom, I was hooked. 

In the past I had taken ‘Twills on Four’, the in-person class with Jane. So in January 2020 when Jane posted her first Online Guild class of the year, Season 4 – Episode 1 – Introduction to Twill & Simple Two Stripe Sample, I watched the videos and took notes. Once the video session was complete I reviewed my notes and doodles and had an ‘a-ha moment’. I kept seeing “borders” and I was intrigued with mixing plain weave and twill together. I just wanted to play on a warp ASAP.

I decided to skip the samples for this guild session and go right to weaving towels. My stash did not have enough Charcoal 8/2 Cotton but there were two cones each of Olive and Natural. My brother is having a big birthday later in the year and he likes green so why not make towels? I made the warp wider than suggested by Jane and wove a couple of inches of each technique that she demonstrated on her loom video (so I would have a condensed sample for myself). Then I started playing with what I learned from this episode.

My first sample where I could see borders and different patterns that I could incorporate into a towel.

Then a towel woven in Olive and using a fibonacci stripe sequence, continuing in the 2/2 twill pattern throughout. Just the colour changes in the stripe sequence:
 

2 Natural
3 Olive
5 Natural
3 Olive
2 Natural

Another towel using Olive weft and a natural for the border. Then changing the twill direction every one inch for the centre part of the towel and finishing off the towel with the same border on the other end.

This towel has the same border as the towel above but I used natural as the main towel colour. In the centre of this towel I used a direction pattern change every four picks creating a zig zag effect in the centre of the towel.

For this towel I played around with colour and design. I have a graphic below in my notes.

Lastly, I found some matching 2/16 cotton in a similar dye lot and switched to a slow clasp weft weave. This idea came from a fellow weaver, Kathy Ready. The two us throw ideas at each other so I gave Kathy’s idea a try. I found this design appealing and it gave me more ideas. So………

I made a second longer warp of 2/8 cotton. Going back to my stash I chose Chocolate for the dark side and a strand of Ivory and Beige alternating for the light side (because I only had a cone and a bit of each). Then I started to play again…….

These are some of the towels from this second warp. I used basket weave for the border on the top left towel, which I will try again. I like the colour that was created by using a strand of the Ivory and Beige. Unfortunately, I could not capture this colour on a photo. So you will have to take my word. 

AND I played some more. I am not use to just weaving with neutral colours so I had to add some colour in this lot of clasp weft towels.

What have I learned from this session? Weaving these towels were fun while trying to decide where to put a border and what type. I love the texture that occurs when using plain weave in between four picks of 2/2 twill. Changing twill direction makes its own zig zag pattern. Basket weave for a horizontal border, who would have thought. This session has given me lots of new ideas to play with and I still have more ideas to try in the future.
 
Below, I have included my rough notes for the second sets of towels and a photo of three stripes that I wove on the last little bit of warp. I will keep this bit of weaving for future reference.



Learn more about the JST Online Guild Weaving Lessons

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JST Online Guild Weaving Lessons

Twills on 4 is coming your way in 2020

For the past few months we have been busy working on the program for 2020.  Twills on 4……Oh My, Oh My, Oh My……it is so exciting. In January of 2020 we start diving into the world of twill structure and will overlay it with everything we learned in Colour & Design and Pushing the Boundaries of Plain Weave. This strong foundation will allow us to take 4 shaft Twills to a new level.

We start the year off learning to draft on graph paper and then we weave a sample exploring our 3 standard twill tie-ups and bring all the repetitive sequences we learned in Colour and Design to Twills (yes, Asymmetry, Plaid, Parrot and Colour and Weave Sequences start playing on Twills).

Episode 2 is very special because we have Bob Keates co-creator of Fiberworks PCW presenting his programme for Mac and PC. 

In addition to building on our Colour & Design gamps, this year includes 4 amazing twill gamps: one using small threadings, one using big threadings, one exploring point twill and an awesome colour and weave gamp on twill that will blow your mind. Each of these gamps explores tie-up possibilities, treadling techniques and colour and weave ideas in the weft.

We also delve into the power and beauty of Basket Weave. One entire episode explores Basket Weave as a vertical design element with other twill threadings. This allows us to frame our twills or just have 2 different structures vertically in our cloth…..so many ideas. Twill and Basket Weave are a fabulous combo, they are like an awesome bottle of wine and a great chunk of cheese. Yep, everything still revolves around food 🙂

Towards the end of the year we will apply the rules of Shadow Weave to all the twill threadings we’ve learned and then we’ll do the same with Weft Faced Twills.  

Weaving is all about systems and this year we’ll be looking at twill as a system. It is very liberating to look at it this way….to learn that we can use all this theory to create new, stunning, modern renditions of old classics. The twill family is a big happy family and they all like to party together. 

If you haven’t guessed it by now….I LOVE WEAVING…..and I LOVE SHARING IT ALL WITH YOU!

Come for the ride….we’re going to have a blast.

Twills on 4!

To learn more about the JST Online Guild click here