Name Block Designs, Checkerboards and more Deflected Doubleweave

I have always longed for a 16 shaft loom! Weavers can sometimes develop shaft envy or loom envy! I look at all the beautiful weaving and works of art I see daily on social media and in galleries and I think to myself…maybe someday! In the mean time, I continue to explore what I can do with my Baby Macomber and Wolf Pup (8 shafts and 10 treadles). I’ve recently returned from assisting elderly parents, but was thankful to take my first weaving workshop of the year using my Wolf Pup at the Outer Banks called “Horoscope Doubleweave” taught by Kathie Roig. Bonnie Tarses was also involved in sharing her Horoscope weaving. This was an opportunity to take a workshop that involved learning from two different weavers on multiple levels! And I believe in supporting other weavers and instructors. Although most of my work has been focused on Deflected Doubleweave in recent years, it’s always fun to design different block weaves with color.

“Phoebe Name Draft” Horoscope Doubleweave

Although my workshop weaving is still to be completed, it was a great learning opportunity to create a name draft in my two warps using the “Desert Dreams” Cotton Cloud kit. Using my grandmother’s name, Phoebe, I set up my threading blocks by assigning a number to the alphabet letters where:

P=16 is Bock A

H=8 is Block B

O=15 is Block A

E=5 is Block B

B=2 is Block A

E=5 is Block B

I then reversed the block order when I using Phoebe’s name a second time spelled backwards in the threading giving me a symmetrical but asymmetric color scheme across the warp. It becomes particularly evident at the boarder blocks by the letter P. No one was like Phoebe and this draft is as original as she was! They could have made a show like the “Queen’s Gambit” about Phoebe’s checker playing. She could not be beat!

Top Phoebe’s Rep Weave Checkerboard (woven by Mary Hardy), Bottom Phoebe’s Checkerboard Woven Sample on loom

While I was gone for three weeks, my pre-orders for my newly printed 4 Shaft Deflected Doubleweave arrived. I will be using this work to teach at additional conferences, guild workshops and on zoom. It is a compilation of my weaving, teaching and learning over the course of the past few years. I also use the blocks in Deflected Doubleweave and when working with 4 shaft, I focus on using two blocks in the threading and multiple blocks in the treadling using 6-10 treadles. I’ve been ice-dyeing warps and incorporating them with painted warps.

4 Shaft Deflected Doubleweave with Ice-Dyed and Painted Warps

Something that I was reminded of during the Outer Banks workshop is that having more than 8 shafts would certainly be wonderful, but it is not a requirement to make beautiful weaving or works of art! My 4 shaft drafts are quite simple in terms of threading, but I spend a great amount of time in ice-dyeing yarn and supporting other yarn dyers to achieve what I want to achieve with my weaving. Planning the colors and designs are both intuitive but also a result of exploration of knowledge, skill as well as theory and practice. This overall concept keeps pushing me forward in my work. The photo links below will take you directly to my Scheduled Workshops and also to read more about my newly self-published 4 shaft focus workshop guide. It can be purchased as a digital download in my website shop.

Teaching and Learning During 4 Shaft Deflected Doubleweave Design in the Reed. Click on this photo to learn more about workshops.

4 Shaft Focus Deflected Doubleweave Workshop Guide (click photo to take you directly to my shop)