Rolling River Bolivian sash
I am making a series of sashes with the techniques I have learned in South America representing the weaving styles from coastal Peru to the Amazon Basin. This is the third in what will hopefully be a set of seven sashes. I learned this design in Potosi with my weaving teacher, Julia. She told me that it was plants and flowers. Recently ,on a trip to the highlands, another woman told me that it was a rolling river with trees on its banks.
It's a complementary warp weave and has two faces.
bolivian and Peruvian pebble weave
I have resigned my English teaching job and finish up this week and so am preparing a bunch of bands as gifts for colleagues and students. These bands will be made into key rings and bookmarks. I still have MANY many more to make!! and am really enjoying just diving into my yarn bag and coming up with random color combinations. I can warp these up on a mini portable warping board I have and be up and weaving in no time.
I am leaving work to go on a ''weaving safari''-learning to weave more techniques here in Bolivia and Chile as well as working as a volunteer with a couple of weaving coops. I hope to go to the US as well and teach backstrap weaving.
I HAVE A NEW BLOG ON BACKSTRAP WEAVING!!
I hope that you will visit me here...............
backstrapweaving.wordpress.com/
I do hope that you will be a frequent visitor and maybe leave me a comment. :-)
See you there!
Laverne
simple stripes
simple stripes tryout: i made a warp with some leftover knitting coton.not ideal but thats what i had laying around.first i warped 2 light ,2 dark treads, in the middle i found a way to warp 1red,1yellow by fixing the tread on each end (don't cut, put a weight on it or so)then i made the stringheddles as laverne explained on flickr.first i had to do it over but second time it worked(forgot the second clockwiseturned loop).then i sew the warp to the sticks as explained in backstrapweaving(four selvedges,B.Taber and M.Anderson). i don't know if i am going to do four selvedges but this way the sticks don't fall out easily.I started weaving one thick ,one thin weft because i remembered that from bandweavinglessons long ago.the thick weft makes one colour come-out more .by weaving two of the same after another you can change the colour that you want to come out most.
Ecuador saddle bag weave
In coastal Ecuador, cotton saddlebags were woven from handspun cotton on vertical looms. Most were woven in simple warp stripes while others had warp float designs. The cotton saddlebags are fast being placed by a woven plastic version and few people are left in the Manabi area who still know how to weave the warp float designs. The bags were used on horse and mule back or slung over a man's shoulder on a trip to town. Owning a warp float design bag used to be a sign of high status. The plainer warp striped bags were used to carry provisions and tools for a day' work in the fields.
I was lucky to be able to spend 3 weeks in Manabi province with a family learning to weave these saddle bags.My teacher was 86 years old and is the only one left in her community who still knows how to weave the bags with the warp float designs. One of her daughters is seen above weaving and sewing a band to the bag edge. Leonardo, her son, is there modeling one of the completed bags and Trini and granddaughter Catalina are using a plastic version on mule back for a trip to the market. Men are reluctant to use the saddle bags anymore in town as it identifies them as country ''peasants'' or ''hillbillies'' amongst the town folk.
The design in my project is from an area further north on the Peninsula Santa Elena. I have used it for the cover of the notebook in which I have documented the saddle bag making process.
Guatemalan hair sash
I learned to make this weft-faced hair sash in Zunil, Guatemala. The women here wrap their hair in these sashes and then go wrapping the sash around their heads. They weave a long strip of plain weave first to wrap the hair and then the part that goes around their heads is covered in little tapestry woven figures in bright colors. The finished sash is 1.5 m long and has gorgeous tassels on the ends.
I had a fantastic teacher-she teaches many of the local teenagers and had an apprentice 15-year old when I was there so there were two of us weaving away together-fun! My teacher also has a floor loom on which she makes the beautiful fabric to make the traditional local skirts. You can see her wearing one in the photo. The loom was only slightly smaller than the room in which it was housed so it was impossible to photograph!
The 4-shaft loom with pedals that they use is built in the village and the weavers tension the warp with a backstrap. The small amount that I wove took me 4 mornings. My teacher could weave that in a couple of hours-weft flying from side to side and the loom rattling and squeaking!
I had the local carpenter make up the pulley system and the heddles and drew, photgraphed the loom and wrote down all the measurements. I hope to have one bulit here once I have made room for it. You can see the parts I had made pictured above.
I NOW HAVE A BLOG ON BACKSTRAP WEAVING!
backstrapweaving.wordpress.com/
I hope you will visit and maybe subscribe. :-)
Laverne
Andean samples
I used pieces of various sample bands and width tests-the things that didn't turn out quite right- to make photo album covers. The albums are small with cut-down photos as these are the albums that I always take with me when I travel. One has photos of my teachers and their work-the weavers I meet love to see clothes,designs, techniques and colors from other countries and regions. Another has photos of other fiber and craft activities I have photographed on my trips-spinning, Panama hat making and things like that. Yet another has pictures of stuff that I have made. And lastly, I take photos of Bolivia and Australia, family and friends.
These albums and photos are wonderful ice breakers when I am trying to make contact with weavers here in South America.
this red one is based on a very wide festival belt used by the people on Taquile Island on Lake Titicaca, Peru.
These are figures that my teachers taught me in Huancayo, Peru.
I NOW HAVE A BLOG ON BACKSTRAP WEAVING!
backstrapweaving.wordpress.com/
I hope you will visit and maybe subscribe. :-)
Laverne
Mapuche influence
I copied and adapted designs that I saw in books on Mapuche weaving. The main design is on the cover of a book I have where it is being woven into a blanket in very thick yarns. This I copied exactly. I have since seen variations of this same design on old ponchos and other pieces-basically the same form- stem , leaves, buds and flower and it is interesting to see how this old design has evolved into its present form. The old forms can be seen above.
It was woven on my Navajo loom when I wasn't ready to attempt such a wide piece on my backstrap. I ended up having to sew folds into it to fit the cushion which it now adorns.
I later wove the main tree design on my backstrap using my handspun llama fiber (pictured above)
I NOW HAVE A BLOG ON BACKSTRAP WEAVING!
backstrapweaving.wordpress.com/
I hope you will visit and maybe subscribe. :-)
Laverne
Mapuche sample
I learned this supplementary warp technique in Huancayo, Peru making little bird and geometric figures for a border on a wider piece of weaving. Later I studied it again in Cabanaconde, Peru-a variation, but again used to decorate only a small part of a large weaving.
Once when visiting a farm in southern Argentina, the owner showed me a belt that had been made by the wife of his Mapuche farmhand many years earlier. I was surprised to see that it had been woven using this very same supplemetary warp technique-large colorful geometric patterns that filled the width of the belt. I then became fascinated by Mapuche designs and the use of this technique. Recently I was given a beautiful book of Mapuche designs and was able to use it to weave the above band.
As always when I use a new yarn or, as in this case, a new combination of yarns, it is difficult to judge how wide the piece will be and so I started out too wide and the band gradually narrowed. I never use tenter sticks or stretchers but now I know how to gauge the width of this number of warps with this combination of yarns and will try again!!. The blue warp is much thicker than the ground weave so that the supplementary warp pattern jumps out of the background.
I had been trying for months online without success to make contact with someone in the Mapuche community who would teach me to weave. In May, on my way to Australia, I got stranded in Santiago airport for hours and made friends with a Mapuche family and now I am going to go and weve with them in November!!
Teeny band
i learned this Andean pick up weave when I was traveling in Peru. My teacher used cotton not much thicker than sewing cotton and we wove tiny bands. However, when I returned home I wove bags, belts and wall hangings using my own handspun llama fiber or crochet cotton- a lot easier to handle and see the thicker warps.
In this project I was attempting to find a way to make really thin bands to use as bookmarks. Most of the bookmarks I had made before were too bulky to use in books so I used a warp of sewing cotton which I plied on my drop spindle. The idea was to make a long band and then cut it into several bookmarks. However, I couldn't bring myself to cut it when it was done and so it is destined to be my new camera strap.
I would like to make larger very detailed pieces with sewing cotton-as long as my eyesight holds out! The range of colors available in sewing cotton is wonderful.
The edge design is typical of the Bolivian highlands especially in a place called Calcha. The main motif is a star design used by the Guarani people in the lowlands where I live.
Naturally Bolivian
Here are a couple of projects I wove using my own handspun llama fiber-spun and plied on a drop spindle. The upper project is zippered weaving tool bag woven in natural brown, white and black llama fiber. the other colors are cochineal with a bit of saffron, tea and spearmint leaves. The weave is warp-faced double weave and was taught to me by Juia in Potosi.(pictured above).
The lower project is on the cover of the journal I wrote documenting how I learned this pick-up weave in Peru with Margarita (pictured above). The dark green is from coca leaves and the light green from spearmint leaves.
