Weft Faced Wool Rug Following Class Notes From Years Ago

     

About fourteen years ago, I took a weekend rug weaving class from Jason Collingwood.I kept my woven sample and class notes, but never made a rug.

I would like to show in this post some of the things I learned and had to relearn from this class. There are techniques I could have done better and others that made me happy that I still remembered.

I used a wool area rug in my living room for inspiration. The dark green, navy, dark red and natural colors go well together.

One of the first things I learned was to not use waxed linen for the warp. I had a terrible time tying it onto the front rod. It was almost impossible to get the knots to stay tied. An 8/5 linen works well at 6 ends per inch. They should be doubled and put in the reed at 3 doubled ends per inch.

Jason Collingwood does not recommend the lashing method for starting a rug, but I think I will try it anyway for the next one to see if I can keep an overhand knot tied tightly.

I started the rug with some heavy unwaxed linen to get the warp spaced correctly and to give me a tiny bit of weaving for my temple to grip. It is recommended to use the temple almost from the first pick of weft, even if only a couple teeth grip the rug.

It is essential to get a straight edge before starting the rug. The weft tends to run downhill on each edge, so it is necessary to compensate for that by weaving small triangles at each edge, as seen right before the red twining starts.

I started the rug with a twined row of red linen, followed by a second row of natural linen twined in the opposite direction. The ends need to be within the row and not at the edge. It may take using a large needle to maneuver the threads. The tan ends in the photo are overlapped and left hanging until more weaving is completed.

Wool yarn was chosen. I used several strands, with the number depending on the thickness. Another thing learned: It may take a little experimenting to get the same thickness with each grouping. The woven rug thickness is about 1/4” or slightly more. The thickness didn’t end up consistent, so I will have to pay better attention to the number of strands used for each color.

Something to consider when choosing yarn is how many strands to use. The more that are used, the more hand threading individual ends into the rug will need to be done. I will show the method further on.

These are some of the shuttles I used. The long ones and the ski shuttles are good for full width weaving and the short ones worked well on the center diamond, where I was making short passes.

Starting a new color of yarn is not done like weaving with finer yarn and a closer sett. With several strands woven together, the thickness needs to be staggered. Leave about six to eight inches of tail at the edge. Pull half of the threads out between different warp threads and take the other half around the selvedge threads twice, as shown in the photo. The wrap at the selvedge prevents a gap from forming at the edge. Bring the edge ends into the shed and stagger them between the other tails.

Arch the weft. It may take some trial and error to get the right amount of extra yarn in the shed to prevent the edges from pulling in. Your temple will help maintain an even width.

Bubble the weft evenly before beating. With the beater brought forward, change to the next shed and beat again.

It will take quite a few woven rows before the weft will stay tightly in place.

Once the weft stays packed down, each one of the ends needs to be woven into the rug. I use a heavy packing needle with a curved end. The needle is threaded down in the channel made by the doubled warp threads next to the tail. An inch or a little more is enough. Thread the end and pull it into the channel.

This needs to be done after the weft is packed and before it rolls over the breast beam.

Once a group of ends has been threaded into the channels, pull the beater forward and hold tightly while tugging gently on each thread.

Release the beater and then trim off each thread at the surface of the rug.

My photo shows some looks that can be created with plain weave. The simplest is a solid color stripe. Vertical stripes are woven with two colors alternating. Checks are just a variation of vertical stripes. Weaving two rows of the dark color will change the placement of the dark and light check block.

Cross stripes can be quite attractive and vary by how many passes are made before changing colors. In this stripe, the narrow rows are two passes and the center darker stripe is four passes.

Note that this stripe is close to the beginning of the rug, so the needle is threaded away from me. Once I had a couple inches woven, I threaded the ends toward me.

The photo shows what the packing needle looks like. With the hook facing up, the eye goes side to side. If it is difficult to thread the needle eye, a thin plastic floss threaded loop works well.

This post has become quite long, so I am ending with the photo of the rug off the loom.

I will make another post soon about a better way to change colors, especially in the checked areas in order to eliminate the bulge at the selvedge and keep the height of the stripe even.

I also want to show how to do the diamond and a few things I learned while weaving it.

Until then, enjoy your own pursuits.

A Question About My Rag Rug Techniques Post

Judy wrote to me with a question:

You said you thread your edges 4-4-3-3, but you weave raising 1&2 together and 3&4 together.  Doesn't that leave your edges without warp threads on the underside?

Judy Klineburger

Here is my answer, in case others had the same question.  Here is a close-up photo of what she is asking about.

Hi Judy,
Sorry it took me a while to be able to reply.  I had to go back onto the May 23, 2010 blog post, Rag rug weaving tips, to see what I said and then look at old photos to see if I had anything I could show to you.  I ended up taking a close-up photo of one of the rugs from that particular warp.  Using that technique, my hems are plain weave, 1-3 vs 2-4, which will have each thread separate except the last four edge threads, which will be doubled.  When I get to the body of the rug, I weave 1-2 vs 3-4.  You are right about the four edge threads all rising or sinking together, acting as one thick thread.  They will alternate with the next two warp threads.  Take a look at the attached photo.  I tried to separate the weft a little right above the red so you could see the four warp threads that the weft is wrapping around.  If you don't want to raise four threads together, you could change the last two threads to shaft one or two.  The best thing to do is just try it both ways and weave the one you like the best.  It is simple to untie the last bundle on each side and re-thread the last two warp threads.

Working With Teens is Such a Pleasure

Way back in March, our thirteen year old granddaughter Emily came over for a weekend and decided she wanted to make a chenille scarf.  This is how it looked as she was getting started.

 After multiple weekends of weaving, she finally came to the end of her warp tonight!  She was very excited about finishing it, and wanted to get a photo of it built up on the cloth beam.

 
This certainly looks like a happy weaver!

It is a long scarf, but just what she wanted.  I think we started with three yards of 1300 yards per pound rayon chenille warp.  It was sett at 16 epi, and was woven with plain weave.

Of course, she knows she still needs to braid the ends into fringe, and she got a little start tonight before heading to bed.  I wish I didn't have to work tomorrow, so I could help her with the knot tying, and then the wet finishing. 

I'm so proud of how diligently she worked on it without anyone leaning over her shoulder every step of the way.  She learned to use the electric bobbin winder, and after helping her with the first one, she did all the others on her own.

Today, when she was almost done, she came to get me to show me how the weft was starting to curve up at one end.  Most people wouldn't even notice, but she has such a good eye for that type of thing.  I reminded her to pull the beater from the middle, and we jiggled the loom around a bit to get it squared up, since we had moved it.  I tightened a couple edge threads, and it seemed to fix the problem. 

Hopefully she will get it done by the weekend.  Fortunately, there is no rush.  With the heat we have been having, I don't think she will want to wear it this week!