Some design work

Just a few things I've been working on lately using double weave techniques with black and white yarns. Even though painting out designs can be time consuming, I love the process. After I've chosen my colours and yarns, I usually sit down and mix them up in gouache and ink, play around with ideas as I go. Illustrator comes in handy if I want to try out other colour combinations or work on scale and balance. I have eight days of my residency left and plans for four different warps. Not impossible, but certainly ambitious. I just bought a few new colours in silk that I want to try out in a triple weave design. That is, if I can get my head around how it all works.  

I've been wanting weave a warp and weft ikat fabric for a while and have resisted. Mostly because the process itself is very labour intensive and you need to be exact in your set up. Once on the loom, it's quite easy to weave, and it calls for using simple weave structures. I'm thinking of layering slight changes in dye colour over one another. The design itself will either be a luna or triangle motif, and was thinking I might use either linen or silk yarn. Linen can be troublesome to weave with, but certainly always worth it in the end.