Double Weave - On the Loom
To create Woven signals I need to understand how textiles are made and designed. Which techniques can allow the weaving of a color change only at certain spots on the textile? Industrial/computer-controlled looms are all based on the functionalities of a floor looms. The softwares are based on the draft sketches used by hand weavers. Once I understand hand weaving, I will be able to bring the project to a next phase. But for thesis, I will weave it by hand. Then, I will be able to design for industrial looms.
I work at the Textile Arts Center located in Brooklyn. In March, I took an advanced weaving class to learn how to weave textiles that have more than one layer. The technique is called Double weave. But first, let me explain how the loom works.
I work on a Schacht Baby Wolf:
I work at the Textile Arts Center located in Brooklyn. In March, I took an advanced weaving class to learn how to weave textiles that have more than one layer. The technique is called Double weave. But first, let me explain how the loom works.
I work on a Schacht Baby Wolf:
It has 4 harnesses:
Each harness controls a section of threads and you can control which one is up or down with pedals:
So, depending on which pedals I press, a harness goes up. I can have more then one harness up too.
At the back, the yarn is completetly rolled around a beam:
Then the threads go around another beam towards the harnesses:
Then every thread is passed through a heddle:
I am now facing the front of the loom. So the threads come from the back beam, through the heddles :
and then through the reed:
The reed is is use to beat the weft after it has been woven in the shed:
The reed also determines the EPI (Ends per inch) of the textile. We define the EPI according to the thickness of the warp yarn and the texture of the textile we desire to have. A small EPI means fewer warp threads per inch so will create a very light and flexible textile. If there is a high EPI, it means there will be more warp threads per inch so the textile will be more dense. For the sample that I woven in this pictures, the yarn was so small that I had an EPI of 30. This means that there are 30 warp threads end in a inch.
Double weave is a technique that allows to weave a textile that has more then one layer. So I press the pedal 1 and 2, the harnesses 1 and 2 go up:
If I press the pedals 3 and 4, the harnesses 3 and 4 go up. This means I set up the loom so I could have two colors on two layers woven separately:
I can then have to possibility to create patterns. I can have the back layer coming up front only at certain spots. This is how most of woven textiles are made.
I can play with colors, patterns, textures and I can mix the two layers in one layer:
Here is how it is done. It works like a positive and negative of an image. If I want to weave a rectangle that has the back layer color on top, I need to raise the back layer and pick up the threads I will want to see on top:
If we look underneath in what is called the shed (the space where I will pass the weft), we can see that it tells the loom that I want to weave a certain section of the back layer on top.
Then I pass the boat shuttle of the weft that has the yarn for the top layer color:
As you can see, the white weft warp is visible where the warp is white, but not where I picked up the back layer:
Then I do the opposite for the back layer. I pick up the white that I want to have on top, and I weave the back layer weft color through:
As you can see, the yellow yarn is visible only where the background layer has been pick up: