Circles

I weave in straight lines.  There are structures where warp and weft bend, but I weave in straight lines.  So there is nothing more challenging that to create the illusion of circles.  With my 16 harness loom, one can create a 16x16 grid, sort of like a very coarsely grained 256 pixel image.  Not a 256 megapixel image, but two hundred fifty-six actual little squares on graph paper.  Not every combination works, one can't have a thread floating out in space for a whole inch before being woven in and anchored down.  It would get caught on every passing finger or zipper and snag.  But even with the remaining subset of interlacements that do create workable cloth, the 16 harness loom has enough variables that computer assistance is extremely handy.

For plain weave, over-under-over-under, one can use a 2 harness loom, with only 2 options, number one harness up and number two harness down, or number one harness down and two up, to create the two sheds in which to propel the shuttle to create cloth.  Work up to 4 harnesses, all of a sudden there are 14 possible combinations (over 1, under 2-3-4, over 1, under 2, 3, under 4, etc).  With an 8 harness loom, 254 combinations.  With my 16 harness baby, 65,534 possibilities.  I don't know about you, but I started forgetting people's phone numbers when I had to know all 10 digits, since they started with different area codes inherited from moves 3 cities ago.

With the help of Bonnie Inouye's book, Exploring Multishaft Design, and workshops with Jannie Taylor and Sharon Alderman, I created a draft that worked.  Graded circles in various sizes.  I wove up several scarves using 8/2 Tencel yarn.  One particularly fetching combination of cream, white and grey will be entered in the Marin County Fair this summer, come visit it over the July 4th weekend.