Wow, what a day
It was fantastic to welcome Laura Thomas to The Loom Shed on 16th October for a workshop on 3 end leno weaving. Our weavers arrived with their looms part warped up – the full instruction sent out before the workshop, and set themselves up at the tables whilst we got the kettle on!
The first stage of the workshop was Laura demonstrating with different ways that we could prepare our looms to create the leno – using doups or beads. Laura had also brought with her a huge range of samples that she has woven using the leno techniques, which was an excellent way to discover how the fabric worked off the loom.
Our next challenge was to set up our own looms with our chosen leno technique, this involved threading beads on to warp ends or making doups of the correct size for our looms. It was pretty fiddly but once the warp ends were going where we need them to go, it became quite straightforward! sleying the reed and tying on completed the set up of the looms
A 40 minute pause for lunch – it was still warm enough in the sunshine to have our lunch outside, for this workshop it was veg chilli with rice, sour cream, tortilla chips and cheese!
Then the weaving could commence. Leno weaving shows off the weft so it was wonderful to be able to spot the different yarns that the weavers had brought with them from hand-spun to fibre tops. Laura also had a range of fancy yarns for the weavers to use, and it was certainly exciting to notice the dramatic differences between the wefts.
There is still warp left for the weavers to weave up at home, and they have promised to share some more pictures with us. we will post them here to show you more.
We are already plotting with Laura for another Leno workshop sometime next year, it would be great to have you join us.