About 25 years ago I was gifted an old and battered up Dryad table loom from a local college.
I spent hours with wire wool, brass polish, sander and beeswax to bring it back to decency.
Then I warped it up and wove on it twice, not knowing what I was doing - following instructions from a Readers' Digest crafts book.
Since then it travelled the world with great plans but without weft or warp.
Thanks to Judith D. I was introduced to the word Saori last month.
And I thought "This is my type of weaving".
Terri Bibby gave me my initial taster (very generously).
And then Lyn P. helped me warp-up my darling loom up.
Looms are a bit like harps. People give them personalities and even names I expect, if not, they ought to. I am waiting for my loom to speak to me - my daughter did this before naming her harp.
There is a whole philosophy to Saori weaving involving freedom of expression and not getting hung up on rules - there are no mistakes and it is just pure pleasure to put up and down whichever set of heddles the hand falls upon and weave-in colour and texture intuitively.
So I though I would leave the loom accessible in the living room with various fibres from my stash piled temptingly in a basket and perhaps my friends and family would pick up some colour or thread they like and weave.
This is exactly what happened today in the stitching group. I am thrilled with a warm glow.
Lyn and I warped up for a 3m narrow length of cloth so I can at least aspire to making a vest.
I thought I would weave some small pieces as samples. But since the whole process is one of experimentation (my middle name)… why does this first weaving need to be considered a small sample?
The first few inches please me greatly… roll on the next yard.
