Explore the possibilities for designing and weaving decorative motifs - teddy bears, trees, tomatoes, letters and numbers! Learn how to design motifs on graph paper and to weave numerous variations using a point twill and straight draw threading. Experiment with positive/negative images, offset and reversed figures, combinations of words and motifs etc. An eight-shaft (or more!) loom is required. (Note, WGB has eight-shaft table looms that you can rent.) Yarn requirements and warping instructions will be sent to participants.

Arlene Joslyn Ilgenfritz loves to weave fanciful figures, one-of-a-kind pieces and three-dimensional whimsy. A past Dean of the Weavers Guild of Boston, she is active in the New Hampshire Weavers Guild and is a member of the Loons and the Wednesday Weavers - study groups that "keep her on her toes"!

What’s so special about handwoven garments? Why cut into your handwoven fabric, when squares and rectangles are the shapes we weave? If you don’t already know the answers to these questions from first hand experience, then this is the workshop for you! Students will learn the basics of cutting, stabilizing and sewing with handwoven fabric of all weights and fibers. Appropriate pattern selection for fit and style will be covered, and students will create a notebook of seam finish samples and stabilizers while learning some tricks of the trade to make sewing easier and more enjoyable. A sewing machine in clean, working order and a familiarity with sewing basics are required for the class.

Material/hand-out fee of $12.00 payable to the instructor.

Sharon Baker Kelly, the "Diva Weava," brings 40 years of sewing experience to her handwoven garment construction. She asks her students to forget notions of "quick" when sewing with their precious handwoven fabric. The process of choosing fibers and structures for weaving is joyous and challenging, and creating one-of-a-kind wearable sculptures with this vibrant fabric is an enviable art. Sharon has enthusiastically embraced handwoven fabric as her fiber medium of choice, and enjoys inspiring others to join the fold.

Have you ever looked at a family heirloom or a textile in a museum and wondered how it was woven? This workshop will help you find the answers to your questions. It will cover how to tell if a textile is handwoven, approximately when it was woven and where, or if the textile was imported. Many antique textiles will be provided for study and analysis. Participants are encouraged to bring to class any examples they have as well. No materials fee.

Marjie Thompson enjoys being "stuck" in the pre-20th century weaving world. She is the coordinator of the Complex Weavers "Early Weaving Books and Manuscripts" study group, past Dean of Weavers Guild of Boston, past president of Complex Weavers, and incoming president of NEWS. She has written many magazine articles and is the co-author of Forgotten Pennsylvania Textiles of the 18th and 19th Centuries, The Huck Pattern Collection, Miniature Patterns for Weaving by Josephine Estes, and the editor of The Gartner manuscript.

Spaces are limited, so register early! Mail a check made out to the Weavers’ Guild of Boston to:

Patricia Morton
Special Workshop Chair
41 Birchmeadow Road
Merrimac, MA 01860-1826

Please make sure to note which workshop for which you are registering.

This fall we are lucky to have Anne Field of New Zealand visit us on her multi-country tour. She will be teaching both a Friday afternoon lecture in addition to our regular October meeting, and a Special Weekend workshop.

This lecture summarizes what makes pleated and puckered fabrics, on 4 and 8 shaft looms, with samples to handle and discuss. Various yarns will be analyzed for the effect they would have in such weaves,
and finishing methods that achieve the best results will be covered.

Anne has a new book coming out on Collapse Weave, which we expect to be available from Web's.

This lecture is open to the public at no charge. Bring your friends!

The Friday lecture is on Collapse Weave, a topic Anne has studied in depth. She has just completed a book on this topic. This lecture will be at the Merrimac, MA, public library (www.merrimaclibrary.org) at 1 PM on Friday, October 19^th, 2007. Members of other guilds will also be invited to this lecture. Directions to Collapse Lecture

The Special Workshop topic is Dévoré. Dévoré is the art of surface design whereby part of the material is chemically removed, leaving a pattern on the fabric. The devorant paste burns out viscose and plant (cellulose) fibers such as cotton or linen, while leaving other fibers such as polyester and animal fibers (silk and wool) intact. We will use stencils to apply the devorant to our samples. The workshop samples may be worked either on-loom or knit. Information learned from either sampling method will be applicable to both weaving and knitting.

Bring a Loom and Weave: You’ll need a 2 or 4 shaft, pre-warped loom which can be a rigid heddle, table, or floor loom. All of the weaving will be done in plain weave, with pre-wound warps provided by the instructor. At the workshop students will sample various weft combinations of plant and animal/synthetic fibers on this warp. The samples will then be cut off the loom; the dévoré solution applied, dried, then ironed and washed out.

Bring Your Needles and Knit: Knit three samples by hand or machine prior to the class, using yarns and instructions provided by the teacher. At the workshop, students will knit further samples, to which the dévoré solution will be applied, dried, ironed and washed out.

Location: Essex Art Center, Lawrence, MA (www.essexartcenter.com)

Registration: The registration form was in the Spring newsletter. If you don't have that, please send Patricia the check made out to the Weavers' Guild of Boston, along with your name, address, phone number, email address, and whether you want to knit or weave. Send registrations to:

Patricia Morton
41 Birch Meadow Road
Merrimac, MA 01860-1826

Biography: Anne Field has been weaving and spinning since 1962, and for the past 25 years has been teaching regularly in New Zealand, Australia, Canada, the United Kingdom, Europe and the United States. Her work has been entered in many exhibitions, both in New Zealand and overseas. Anne's published books include Weaving with the Rigid Heddle Loom , The Four-shaft Table Loom, The Ashford Book of Spinning, The Ashford Book of Weaving, Spinning Wool: Beyond the Basics, and Collapse Weaves. Her seventh book, on Dévoré, is in process.

For more information, visit http://www.annefield.co.nz/workshop/woven.html, or contact Patricia at pmorton@surfbest.net, or 978-346-9625. Please note that this workshop is subject to Anne’s being able to get a work Visa for the US.

Despite a Nor’easter, Mary Berent’s design workshop was a success. 11 of us managed to get most of the class completed. We wove cotton warps of various colors and threadings, using a variety of wefts. These samples provided interesting combinations of patterns, and ideas for use in a variety of fabrics. The class assignments included Summer and Winter, Doubleweave, Overshot, Twill and Basket, M’s and O’s, twill value studies, network twill and plaited twill.

Mary’s lectures covered topics on the various aspects of designing great cloth, such as: the purpose of the cloth, yarn type, sett, float length, hand, fabric care, loom limitations, durability, finishing, sewability, structure, and color. She helped us with ideas for problem fabrics that we were working on, or with projects where we just needed a different view for design inspiration.

Mary graciously provided an extra copy of her workshop handouts for the guild library. I hope to collect extra woven samples from each weaver to fill it in.  -- Patricia Morton

Dorothy Solbrig

Laurie Autio's color study browns

Photos

Mary's Design Circle

Mary's  weaving

Mary's loom

For a list her articles, click here.  

Patricia Morton
Special Workshop Chair
41 Birch Meadow Road
Merrimac, MA 01860-1826

Phone:  978-346-9625

Questions: Email to: pmorton@surfbest.net

WGB Refund Policy: A full refund will be granted at any time if the space can be filled.  If cancellation is 30 or more days prior to workshop, a 50% refund will be granted if the space cannot be filled.  No refund will be granted within 30 days if the space is not filled.