Zaphira's new Belt
Jun. 26th, 2018 09:45 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
janestarzWhile Zaphira is probably still freaking out about being pronounced Empress by her traveling companions, I meanwhile am mostly freaking out about her new dress. I'm so horribly unsure about how to go about it that the indecisiveness is paralysing. I'm getting there, though, the plan is formulating in my mind.
(What I was mostly unsure about was whether to go for the full 12th century style, which is unfitted rectangles and triangles and slightly baggy -- which might not work so well for my pear-shaped figure -- or mix 15th century fitting with the 12th century dress and call it a crossover event)
This week I will not have the time to work on the dress, there's 2 dress shirts, 2 trousers and a t-shirt that need making, but after this week it's July and that means the August event is just around the corner. I will have to get started on the dress soon.
Meanwhile, a new dress means new accessories as well and the colours of the new dress (which will be my summer dress) don't match my winter accessories. A new belt is an absolute must, just as fake hair for the braids, some ribbons to bind them with, and a veil.
My sock yarn stash is HUGE, so that was the obvious choice. Sock wool has somewhere between 20 and 25% polyamide (nylon) to make it sturdier and it comes in a ton of colours. I also realised I have a ton of colours that match my new dress linens, from the pinks and blues of sunset in various shades of light and dark. Combined with a light grey it works really well -- even off-white would have been too bright.
The design took a little while longer, I must have spent two hours in the Gimp, happily bucket-filling the honeycomb pattern and creating patterns. I had maybe 30 tabs open in my browser for inspiration, reading 'A Spinner A Weaver's blog about how to make a design pop and using her patterns as inspiration. In the end, after several drafts, I decided to copy her beautiful design (first one on the page) in my own colour scheme.
While Doortje helped me sort the colours, I cut 5.3 meter lengths of each colour, hoping to create a 4 meter long band. It should probably be a bit shorter or I might trip over it, but it should be long enough to wrap my waist twice and hang to calf-height.
As the dress will be blue, the band's main colour is red/pink with some blue details in the center. I haven't got a clue how wide the band will become once I start weaving, sock wool has some body to it so I might up with a 6 cm wide band (or more!). I used roughly 10 grams of yarn per colour, so it's a nice stash buster for all those odd ends at the end of a skein. And it's a good test for this heddle, as it's fully threaded except for 2 holes on the side.
Threading the warp is what I hate most about any weaving project, although it wasn't too bad when I still had my inkle loom (I sold that on Marktplaats a few years back). The reason I stopped cardweaving altogether is because I always mix up S- and Z-, that I don't know how ABCD on the holes go, from which side you should look at your cards, which way you should turn if ABCD is actually ADCB and by the time you figure out one of these, the others are all mixed up again. It was just a hot mess, combined with lots of tangled yarn. Ugh.
(Maybe some day, though? Never say never, right...)
After cutting all the ends, I threaded the heddle in the right order and had a big bunch of knotted yarn hanging from my heddle. The rest of the evening was spent carefully pulling the threads from the knot one by one, trying very hard not to tighten the tumble and hoping very much that it will not felt while I'm pulling on them (I've had sock projects felt together for a bit when frogging). I tied the long tails into five bunches, which I can unroll when I need, and are easier to untangle later on if needed.
The belt will have the darkest wine red on the outside, with a lovely colour fade to fuchsia. Then a stripe of lighter blue, with a pinstripe of fuchsia will border the main diamond/snowflake in the grey field in the centre of the band.
I am already loving it!
Tonight I can start weaving, and hopefully I will have some free time in my schedule next week to start work on the dress. I think I've figured out pretty much what I want to do with it now, so all I need is time and some free head-CPUs to work with.
(What I was mostly unsure about was whether to go for the full 12th century style, which is unfitted rectangles and triangles and slightly baggy -- which might not work so well for my pear-shaped figure -- or mix 15th century fitting with the 12th century dress and call it a crossover event)
This week I will not have the time to work on the dress, there's 2 dress shirts, 2 trousers and a t-shirt that need making, but after this week it's July and that means the August event is just around the corner. I will have to get started on the dress soon.
Meanwhile, a new dress means new accessories as well and the colours of the new dress (which will be my summer dress) don't match my winter accessories. A new belt is an absolute must, just as fake hair for the braids, some ribbons to bind them with, and a veil.
My sock yarn stash is HUGE, so that was the obvious choice. Sock wool has somewhere between 20 and 25% polyamide (nylon) to make it sturdier and it comes in a ton of colours. I also realised I have a ton of colours that match my new dress linens, from the pinks and blues of sunset in various shades of light and dark. Combined with a light grey it works really well -- even off-white would have been too bright.
The design took a little while longer, I must have spent two hours in the Gimp, happily bucket-filling the honeycomb pattern and creating patterns. I had maybe 30 tabs open in my browser for inspiration, reading 'A Spinner A Weaver's blog about how to make a design pop and using her patterns as inspiration. In the end, after several drafts, I decided to copy her beautiful design (first one on the page) in my own colour scheme.
While Doortje helped me sort the colours, I cut 5.3 meter lengths of each colour, hoping to create a 4 meter long band. It should probably be a bit shorter or I might trip over it, but it should be long enough to wrap my waist twice and hang to calf-height.
As the dress will be blue, the band's main colour is red/pink with some blue details in the center. I haven't got a clue how wide the band will become once I start weaving, sock wool has some body to it so I might up with a 6 cm wide band (or more!). I used roughly 10 grams of yarn per colour, so it's a nice stash buster for all those odd ends at the end of a skein. And it's a good test for this heddle, as it's fully threaded except for 2 holes on the side.
Threading the warp is what I hate most about any weaving project, although it wasn't too bad when I still had my inkle loom (I sold that on Marktplaats a few years back). The reason I stopped cardweaving altogether is because I always mix up S- and Z-, that I don't know how ABCD on the holes go, from which side you should look at your cards, which way you should turn if ABCD is actually ADCB and by the time you figure out one of these, the others are all mixed up again. It was just a hot mess, combined with lots of tangled yarn. Ugh.
(Maybe some day, though? Never say never, right...)
After cutting all the ends, I threaded the heddle in the right order and had a big bunch of knotted yarn hanging from my heddle. The rest of the evening was spent carefully pulling the threads from the knot one by one, trying very hard not to tighten the tumble and hoping very much that it will not felt while I'm pulling on them (I've had sock projects felt together for a bit when frogging). I tied the long tails into five bunches, which I can unroll when I need, and are easier to untangle later on if needed.
The belt will have the darkest wine red on the outside, with a lovely colour fade to fuchsia. Then a stripe of lighter blue, with a pinstripe of fuchsia will border the main diamond/snowflake in the grey field in the centre of the band.
I am already loving it!
Tonight I can start weaving, and hopefully I will have some free time in my schedule next week to start work on the dress. I think I've figured out pretty much what I want to do with it now, so all I need is time and some free head-CPUs to work with.
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no subject
Date: 2018-06-27 07:25 am (UTC)Herkenbaar... :-P
Kaartweven is één vaardigheid, kaartweefpatronen lezen een tweede. Het heeft mij ook even gekost voordat ik doorhad dat er _meerdere manieren_ zijn om patronen weer te geven, en dat de een z'n ABCD bij een ander ADCB is. En dat de definitie van S en Z afhankelijk is van of je kijkt naar de stand van de kaartjes of de stand van de draden. Patronen zonder legenda zijn dus onbruikbaar. Dus nee, het ligt niet aan jou. ;-)
Ik moet me toch ook eens gaan verdiepen in bandweven. Nog nooit gedaan, maar het lijkt me een stuk minder frustrerend (en veel sneller) dan kaartweven.
no subject
Date: 2018-06-27 03:45 pm (UTC)De patronen zijn veel minder complex, dus je kunt ook minder fout doen. De site van "A Spinner A Weaver" waar ik naar linkte heeft heel veel mooie voorbeelden!