Tapestry Weaving at Maiwa Textile Symposium 2013
by Elaine on Oct.14, 2013, under Blog Posts
This past week I had the pleasure of teaching Tapestry at the Maiwa Textile Symposium on Granville Island in Vancouver, BC.
The workshop included students from as far away as Alberta, Victoria, Kamloops as well as Vancouver and the surrounding areas. We met for four days to learn to weave tapestry or to enhance our current skill levels. The participants were keen, asked really good questions and had a spirit of adventure and cooperation. It was a wonderful combination! And also really good energy. We started the class out with warping copper pipe looms using Cotton Seine Twine Finnish #15 at 8 epi, total of 33 threads. For exercises to begin with we played with lines, gradually increasing the number of lines so we had a progression of colour. We practised slit, weft interlock and warp interlock techniques and then started to work on shapes. Everyone had their own ideas and the students were encouraged to follow their hearts and do something they were interested in doing. The students wove with naturally dyed 100% wool 2 ply that was mill spun from Romney sheep. Everyone commented that the natural colours helped to make the choice of colour easy These are some photos of the progress that was made in the course.
There are two others from our workshop that I unfortunately do not have photos of…one is Bonnie who arrived each day, bright and cheery, staying to the end. Bonnie had some challenges getting her fingers to work due to some health issues. Her sampler was the smallest, but there was so much positive energy emanating from it. She loved being in the group learning from the others. Thank you Bonnie for being there! The other very important person was Myrna, our workshop assistant. Myrna helped the students with their weavings as well as helping me getting comfortable with the space. Thank you Myrna!
Thank you also to Maiwa which holds a symposium in the fall of each year. It was a pleasure to work with the owner, Charllotte Kwon, and the rest of the staff at Maiwa.