The Weaver Sews: What to Weave, Part 1

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Before any discussion of clothing, fit, seam finishes or closures, we should consider the fabric.  Since this is a weaving magazine, presumably the fabric will be handwoven.   Clothing issues, fit, and creativity apply to all fabrics, but handwoven fabric needs special handling.

Handwoven Fabric: The original problem child

I liken handwoven fabrics to children with ADHD.  I have two of them (children with ADHD, that is).  Though it has been a joy to watch them grow and navigate life with their outside-the-box creativity, it has been often been difficult to get them to conform to societal standards in situations like grade school. 

And so it goes with handwoven fabric.  The resulting garment will be original, inventive, creative, personal, and at the same time: challenging.

 

The Rectangle: Scarf vs. Yardage

Weaving yardage is not like weaving a scarf.  A scarf is a narrow rectangle.  It must be fluid and soft around the neck.  It is an accent, an accessory.  The sett is usually on the looser side, the beat gentle, and the size rather specific: 8-10 inches wide by 60-72 inches long. 

(Note: The scarf shown here, Enchanted Vista, is part of the Convergence 2010 Albuquerque Eye Dazzlers Multimedia Exhibit.)

Yardage is a different animal altogether. 

Yardage is not an end product, it is a raw material.  I find this fact freeing because there are no final decisions to make when weaving yardage.  It will eventually be made into something. You can change your mind about what to use it for, and many weavers do.

 

 

 

Design for the Yardage, not the Garment…

I never know what I’m going to make when I design handwoven cloth.  Yes, you heard correctly.  I do not plan out the garment that will come from the cloth I’m about to put on the loom.  

I weave cloth because it's fun.  I love the physical motions of weaving, I love the challenge of designing cloth, I even enjoy the tedious job of threading the loom (mostly), and I love turning cones of yarn into fabric.  But when the cloth comes off the loom, I have no idea what I’m going to make with it.

Once the fabric is washed and dried, I roll it up and put it away until the day comes when I’m inspired to sew a garment.  Then I look through my stash of handwoven fabrics to see what wants to play along.  That eliminates the stress of calculations.  Instead of planning things precisely, I chose whatever loom is available, and put on as much warp as the loom can handle, or until I run out of yarn. 

 

What Width Should I Weave?

The size, width, length of the yardage depends on a number of criteria, most importantly, the size of the loom that available.  I have looms ranging from 8 inches wide (my small Structo) up to my 45-inch-wide floor loom. 

Most weavers would assume that a loom with an 8-inch wide weaving width could only be used to weave scarves or samples for a larger piece.  But African textiles are famous for their cloth constructed from narrow handwoven strips, sometimes only 4 inches wide.  The strips are pieced together in any number of creative ways to make a larger piece of cloth.  The effect is colorful and joyous. 

Rigid-heddle looms with a weaving width of 10-12 inches can produce fabric for the front panel of a garment, or half a back, or side panels, or half a sleeve. There are no rules that say a sleeve can’t be pieced together from two halves.  

There are no rules that say a handwoven cloth has to stand alone either.  I frequently use commercial fabrics when the handwoven cloth isn't wide enough to go around the entire circumference of the garment. And of course, two pieces of handwoven cloth can be seamed together to create a wider fabric.

All three of the garments below feature handwoven fabric combined with commercial fabric.  The garment on the right started out as a scarf.

 

 

In a Perfect World… 

When possible, I strive to weave a fabric that, after washing, will give me enough width to cut a full back with no center back seam. 

There is nothing wrong with a center back seam, however.  In fact, jackets fit better with a shaped center back seam like the one pictured to the left. 

(Note:  the yardage for this jacket did not have enough width for center back seam allowances, so I sewed center back darts instead to simulate a shaped back seam.)

I find there is less waste and better horizontal matching when back panels or front panels can be cut side by side on the cloth.  But when that can’t happen, there are other options. 

When students ask how much length they should weave, my answer is always, how much yarn do you have?  I’ve made garments from scarves...and from scraps.  

This two-yard 10-inch-wide fabric, made from Tencel and Cottolin sett at 36 epi, turned into a lovely vest, with commercial-fabric side panels.

I've made garments from 20-year-old handwoven throws, from old work I’ve cut apart because it no longer fit or the style was dated. I’ve made garments from 8 yards of cloth, and everything in between.  The cloth is just the raw material that drives the adventure. 

That said, if you can weave yardage wide enough for a full back cut on the fold, figure a yard or less (depending on the length of the garment) for the front, a yard or less for the back, and three quarters of a yard for each sleeve, throw in another yard or two for miscellaneous things like collars/pockets or whatever (approximately 5-6 yards total).  It doesn’t take a huge amount of yardage for a basic garment.  If your loom is narrow and you have fuller hips, you may want yardage that can be pieced together creatively; if you have a wider loom, take advantage of it. 

I usually weave longer and narrower, since there is less loom waste.  In addition, threading for one yard is the same effort as threading for 10 yards.  I often put on an 8-10 yard warp when I am embarking on a handwoven cloth adventure, anywhere from 25-30 inches wide.  With waste, shrinkage and sampling, I may end up with six-to-eight yards of finished cloth, anywhere from 22-28 inches wide.  I can usually squeak some kind of jacket or garment from that amount.  

If you are the type of weaver who loves to plan the whole project out in advance, select a pattern for the garment you want to weave, carefully fit the pattern to your body, make a muslin (we will talk about muslins in a future column) and then lay the finished pattern pieces out to get a feel for what width and length of cloth would work for that particular pattern...and then weave a lot extra! 

It's better to have more fabric than you need, than too little.  And there are plenty of things to do with fabric leftovers.

 

Clothing is a Journey…

Clothing is my passion because it requires many different kinds of skills and a certain amount of resourcefulness.  “Making it work” was my mantra way before Tim Gunn of Project Runway made it iconic.  For me, this is all about process; it isn’t about the end product.  

Once the piece is complete, and the adventure ended, I mourn the end of a wild and crazy ride.  It's the end of the journey the cloth and I have taken together.  The finished garment gets photographed, put in a cleaner bag to keep the dust to a minimum, and hung in the closet with all my other handwoven garments.  

I occasionally wear them, and there are a few jackets I’ve worn to death, but mostly for me it is about the ride, including the detours, roadblocks, paths to nowhere, and occasionally a fender bender or two.

 

Some Guidelines worth Consideration: Try Vertical

Most of my fabrics have a vertical orientation. 

Vertical patterning looks better on the body and is easier to weave.  Horizontal patterning requires multiple shuttles, and horizontal patterning can be difficult to match up at side and center back seams.  

(Note: To make this jacket match in the vertical seams, I had to cut the fabric on the crosswise grain.  The warp actually runs sideways.  The narrow 22-inch-wide fabric is invisibly seamed horizontally across the middle of the garment.)

 

 

Daryl Lancaster has been playing with thread for most of her life.  She teaches workshops all over North America and inspires handweavers to cut their cloth.  Daryl was the contributing features editor for Handwoven magazine, and has written articles for a variety of publications (including WeaveZine) as well as authored several monographs on weaving and sewing. To learn more, visit her artist's website or follow her blog.

 

To Be Continued…  Next column: Sett and Sampling