It's a proper length of handwoven fabric. Not a simple scarf like I usually dabble in. I have a little Cricket loom which I use for my weaving. It's nothing fancy, just a simple rigid heddle, if I set to, I can usually warp and weave a scarf in an evening should I so desire. For this however, I had a plan, and it required a slightly bigger loom. I'd got some beautifully dyed Gotland from the Wildcraft fibre club, and knew I wanted to weave it, but also knew I didn't just want a scarf from it.
I have a footstool in my living room, just a basic Ikea chipboard cube, with some foam on top and a grey cover, nothing fancy but it works. I came up with the plan of using the Gotland, but knew I'd need lots more yarn.
When I go to shows I often spindle spin for most of the day, nothing fancy, just ransom scraps of fibre, as usually I'll be stopping and starting, and I won't be fully concentrating, so the thickness often varies over the course of a day. I'd saved up all those balls of singles, then plyed them, and the grey's toned really nicely with the Gotland. Add in some purple Masham from the August edition of my Best of British club, and some pink longwool singles that had been gifted to me, and I had a pretty huge pile of yarn. When I was at Texere on the Skip North weekend I picked up 2 cones of grey wool/nylon blend to use for the warp, and I got going.
I borrowed my friend Katherine's Flip loom, worked out the length I needed, added some width on as I knew it would shrink widthways when I took it off the loom and washed it. I wound the yarns on to the shuttle in a random order and used a spit splice to join them.
Definitely not classical weaving, but I love it, and it's a great way to use up scraps of handspun. It's been washed here, but still needs an iron.
