Autumn/Taupe Narrow Scarf on Cricket
Using variegated color yarns gives a chance to embellish plainweave items with changing colors with a minimum of fuss. Usually I combine a solid color warp with variegated weft to get stripes. But I wanted to experiment with variegated warp. My first experiment went well with a black/grey warp and weft (scarf shown earlier).
Here is a yarn I had. Vanna's Choice (VC) acrylic color called Autumn Print. I wanted to try it as warp with a solid weft, VC acrylic solid color Taupe. I stretched it between two chairs and soon found the color pattern repeats at about 198 inches. These chairs are 99 inch part so once around is one color pattern then it repeats. So that is my warp length, 99 inch from back beam to warping peg. So I warped it and wound it on the beam.
If you notice, all the colors on one side are met with a different color on the other side. So I thought I would arrange the warp for thin warp stripes on the heddle.
Red=Light, Taupe=Dark, LL DD LL DD LL DD LL DD LL all the way across.
When I started weaving with the taupe weft, I had this piece that to me looked very mud colored. I didn't like it. I un-wove it and strung the heddle differently.
This time I put the center warps in a horizontal stripe pattern by warping
LD LD LD LD LD LD LD LD
I left two sets of stripes on the outsides for borders (LL DD LL DD)
This time the color is spread out over the whole width of the scarf. I also made it more warp faced by intentionally pulling the width closer. It's warped about 5 1/2 inch, I'm weaving about 4 1/4 inch wide. Since this is too narrow to beat with the heddle, I'm using a ruler to beat the weft and check my width. I'm making this 10 dent heddle piece into a 12 dent heddle piece. Next time I'll start with a 12 dent heddle.
Here it is! (click on picture for larger image) 80 inch long including 3 long fringe, 4-1/4 inch wide. The horizontal stripe pattern carried all the way through even as the warp colors changed from the variegated yarn. When I am weaving I am focused on a small section of the piece, so I was pleasantly suprised with how well the color changes worked in the complete piece. No so much because I'm good, but because the yarn designer did a good job with the color changes.
When I set up the warp, I took advantage of the placement of the 9 inch long yellow sections in the yarn. I made sure I had yellow in the fringe area on each end of the scarf. So I was able to braid yellow with a contrasting color for the end treatment.
I braided the scarf on the loom, it's just easier to control things that way. After cutting, braiding the first end, remove the heddle then wind the scarf onto the beam to get back to the beginning. Then cut, braid and finish the second end.
The color and horizontal stripe pattern has a "native" feel to it so I thought braids would look better than twisted fringe. The fringe looks good, I need more practice to make the ends even. 3 inch long, knotted, then trim yarn 1/4 inch.
Have a good day!
