After several weeks of whining and wimping around about the difficulty of warping the small loom in my usual way, and being partway into the process so I couldn’t back out of it, I talked yesterday with my friend Janis Saunders (The Braider’s Hand) about her technique of getting a warp onto her AVL production looms. Front to back.
(It should be noted here that I’m a self-taught weaver, have always warped my looms FTB because it seems logical to me, and am extraordinarily reluctant – as long as I’m working with a plain, not a sectional, warp beam – to change this practice at which I’m quite proficient.)
(It should also be noted that the reason I can’t do the warping in my “normal” way is not because I’ve suddenly become incompetent but because of the structure of the loom itself.
Janis gave me a description of how she does the job, and we discussed some further variations, and I laughed a lot and felt more than a little foolish and embarrassed.
AND ~ now I can see how to do what I want to do, in much the same way I have previously, though I’ll need to make a few adjustments to my technique which is not necessarily A Bad Thing. Even at this stage of my weaving life (nearly thirty years in), it’s helpful, even sensible, to be flexible about certain elements of the work.
So Monday I’m going to blast away on that warp and make substantial progress. Really.
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