Rugs, Rugs and More Rugs

Marcia K's Rugs with flannel weft strips.

Rug presentation.

The Buellwood Weavers met on April 17^th for another exploration of rug weaving, this time Jean presented basic rug weaving and finishing techniques.  She shared a couple of her rugs a beautiful Krokbragd rug in green, beige and turquoise and a rug woven in traditional Overshot, I believe that is what she called the Brown and white rug. The Krokbragd rug was originally used as bed covering and had one side with long floats which was used against the body to retain the heat.

She gave some pointers on weaving a rug successfully some hints and tips to help our group and showed samples of a few of the many finishing techniques. She also recommended some helpful rug weaving books such as Peter Collingwood’s ‘Rug Weaving Techniques’ and ‘Weaving Contemporary Rag Rugs’ by Heather Allen.  Once again sources for rug weft can be had at the Old Mill in Eaten Rapids MI which has an annual January Yarn sale or R&M Yarns in North Carolina. 

Marcia Kosmerchock was my guest for the meeting and Marcia also brought along some rugs to share with

Marcia's Rep rug on left Rep table runner on right

us. A black, white and red Rep rug and runner that she wove on the same warp…. But she changed the Sett from 40 to 20 (I believe) for the Runner. She has a black rug with a very colorful pattern that she wove with 1.5 inch strips of flannel material see above photo. Marcia was working on a Shwoosh rug that software can be found at http://www.subudesigns.com/downloads.cfm this is a freeware program written by David Raup from Washington Island WI. Choose the download for Rug Design 2004. Unfortunately Marcia had not finished it and did not bring the rug for us to see. Marcia also shared the a warp tie on method we learned from Nadine Sanders using texsolv loops instead of shoe strings that some of you might be interested in trying. I have copies to mail or email if you are interested before the next guild meeting.

We had 12 people in attendance so we had a very nice show and tell:

Lynn surface design dyed cloth using a rusted bicycle chain

Lynn shared the results of her Surface Design class she took at Finlandia University. My favorite of course was the one dyed with a rusted bike chain. She also had samples dyed pink on white with cornmeal as a resist. Discharge dyed velvet and many more beautiful pieces of dyed fabric. 

 Jean shared her wool Jacket that fit her beautifully after she made some adjustments under Mary Sue’s directions at the Workshop last year.

Stephanie reported to us that her Women’s History Article in the MI Tech Women’s Magazine, about our guild did not turn out as she wanted so she replaced it with another article which she promised to share with us. So watch for her article although it is not about us.... :(

Elaine shared with us she received a very interested response to her job applications and is looking forward to a successful interview for an Auto Interior Design job… or as my friend Patty would say “a J.O.B. What is that?” back when women did not need to work! Good luck Elaine with that interview!

woven table runner by Marcia Kosmerchock

Collapse weave samples

Marcia shared her sample Collapse weave cloth she will be using to be included in the Complex Weavers Study Group Sample Exchange next month at Complex Weavers Conference. A garment she wove which included an inlayed ribbon at the neckline, Oh so beautiful!
Along with a couple of very nice table runners she wove this winter. Marcia was happy to announce she had one of her jackets accepted in the Fashion Show at Convergence 2014 in July.

Marcia's ribbon inlay woven top

Steve's woven rug one of three he has finished.

Leslie's Fibonacci pattern rug.

Leslie and Steve have been busy weaving rugs on the loom they borrowed from Finlandia which had a very long warp added and Steve shared 3 of his recent rugs woven with a wool warp. Leslie got into the rug weaving also and wove a rug using the Fibonacci elements of design.  For more information check out:  http://johnlovett.com/design/fibonacci/

Phyllis with her elegant Jacquard Fabric

Phyllis has been busy with teaching but she shared her sample Jacquard woven design with us. It is elegant and she is awaiting the 5 yards of woven material if she can get it woven from 100% polyester
from ‘Victor’ who is located in Quebec Canada.  

For My show and tell I brought along a Mohair Bride’s Shawl that I wove for a lucky bride-to-be and 5

Mary's woven rayon fabric

yards of woven Rayon fabric and hand dyed silk from my stash which I will use for the Mary Sue Fenner Workshop in May 19^th – 21 at Finlandia fiber studio. There is still has room available for this workshop. If you are interested in the workshop or the trunk show please contact Debra Goldman as soon as possible.

The guild will meet again on May 19^th at Gloria Die Church in Hancock at Noon I believe the topic may be Krokbragd Rug weaving. If you are interested in attending the Mary Sue Fenner Trunk Show at the Fiber Studio it will be a 9 am on Monday the 19^th of May and we are inviting the guild members to join us for a reduced fee of $15. For members and $25 for others who wish to attend.  Mary Sue always has many new garments to share with us and it will not be a complete repeat of last year’s garments.

Also we have Ruth Manning coming to Gloria Dei on July 12 for a Design workshop and she will be at the Porkies Folk School July 13^th for a Tapestry Weaving Workshop with Hand Spun Yarn. Looms and yarn will be provided by Ruth. Contact the Friends of the Porkies or Leslie Toombs for more information on these workshops.

Happy Weaving see you next month.