The members of the Fiber Artisans Guild are passionate about their commitment to the fiber community–both locally and internationally. We support groups that help artists and fiber workers and are a member of the Conference of Northern California Handweavers.
November 18, 2018 – From ikat to tapestry
Fiber Artisans met to finish their ikat projects and prepare for next year’s tapestry project. As they sampled the wonderful variety of homemade cookies Phyllis brought,
Sandy, Frank, Phyllis, Sharolene, Christine and her sister, Ann and Anne presented their insights, ideas, and questions about their ikat projects. Frank then showed the dazzling, jaw-dropping collection of indigo-dyed ikat pieces he has collected over the years.
Phyllis also brought a sample of her handspun natural colored cotton fabric.
We then talked about the future tapestry weaving project. In addition to constructing our looms from copper tubing, we will need the following equipment that Sandy showed us.
This includes (from top to bottom) beaters, scissors, a mirror (to see the reverse side), clips, a ruler, bobbins, a basket to hold our stuff, and a bag to keep it in.
We will meet again in January to get started.
August 26, 2018 – Ikat and More
Today we learned about removing the warps we have been carefully tying In patterns that will resist dyes from the frames. This will make them ready to dye with indigo next month. Our warps were mounted on frames with dowels that stretched them back and forth on the frames. This made it possible to tie our resist patterns efficiently for several repeats with one tie rather than having to tie it several times down the entire length of the warp. Each time the warp was doubled back on itself on the frame, it was held in place by a new dowel that was placed behind two pins at that end of the frame. Depending on the length of the warp, this meant there were multiple dowels holding the warp.
We started by placing ample loop ties through the warp wherever we had a dowel holding the warp to the frame. After doing this, we carefully removed the dowels and gathered all the loops from both ends in one hand. This will permit us to lower and then retrieve the warp in our indigo dye pot when we dye it next month. Multiple dips will allow us to control the depth of shade of the indigo. So check back next month to see how we are doing.
You may remember that last month we experimented with some natural dyes from Earth Pigments. After mixing our dyes and learning the process of using the dyes, we took our sample dyes home. Everyone had a limited range of colors to use. Some of us had some amazing work to show and information to share about what worked best for us. Here and some of our results.
Frank stamped patterns on a number of swatches of cloth. He learned which colors work best when used on top of other colors and came up with an amazing number of objects to use as stamps for his swatches. Here are six of his swatches.
Sandy had studied the cave and wall art of our very early ancestors and honors them by copying some of their figures on T-shirts that use the colors of the earth.
Ann also choose to create garment art. Using the stamping technique for the front, she found some of the color had leaked onto the back, despite using a separator to keep this from happening. So she picked up a brush and painted her colors on the back.
Next month: an indigo dye pot and who knows what else!
Dyeing with Earth Pigments
Today’s meeting found us experimenting with earth dyes. First we painted our fabric with fresh soy milk (see http://box19.ca/maiwa/pdf/EarthPigments.pdf ) in the areas where we wanted to use our dyes.
While we hung them out to dry, we chose our colors from The Dye Works natural pigments.
Using a teaspoon of pigment mixed with a tablespoon of soy milk to dampen it, we made our initial colors stirring to make sure the pigment was thoroughly dissolved. 
We put our colors in small containers, carefully labelled them and tried to decide how we would decorate our fabric. 
After the pigments have been thoroughly dissolved, we found some thickened after setting. There still needs to be gum tragacanth thickener added to all the pigments to keep the pigment suspended and to prevent bleeding. It may also help make delicate designs easier to apply to the fabric.
Everyone will take the items we have prepared and decorate their fabric. We will post the results of this experiment in the future.
Progress!
Five of us met to continue tying off sections of our ikat warps. (Most of us only work on these the one day each month when we meet.) We are hoping to have them ready for the dyepot sometime this summer. Each will have a different pattern of threads that have been carefully bound together to resist the dye and will produce a white pattern on the final cloth. Thank heavens we have Natalie’s instructions on how to tie off each section posted here . We all needed a refresher course in how to bind the pattern threads. This is a slow, but pleasant, endeavor. It will be exciting to see how it comes out.
Ann is particularly ambitious and has the wide warp shown at the bottom. She is not following a rigid pattern like most of us but is making a free form design that she is creating as she ties each bundle of warp threads.
February’s Ikat Update
On Sunday, February 18, we met to continue our ikat project. Most people had their ikat frames warped and were ready to tie bundles of warp with tape that with resist the dye when we eventually dip the threads in an indigo dye pot. We found that Natalie was particularly adept at wrapping and tying her warp threads. Here is a video showing her technique.
November 19, 2017 – More ikat
After our introduction to warping for ikat last month, we continued our projects. We found that we needed plenty of space to stretch out our warps in order to prepare them for tying off areas that would resist the dyes we would later use. And several of us found that it would have been easier to start with smaller warp widths than we had imagined for or projects. For example, Frank had used nine separate warp chains to weave the beautiful scarf shown above.
To accommodate our long warps, one of our members who works for Google took advantage of using the “Garage”, a work-space on the Google campus that employees can reserve for creative endeavors. It worked perfectly, allowing us to stretch out our warps and start bundling and tying them for dying.
One of us just starting the project learned from the experience of some of the rest of us and wound a warp for a 2-inch wide project. She easily caught up with others struggling with much wider warps.
And Shar, who had a disaster last month when her warp accidentally was severed, has forged ahead and is already wrapping her warp threads threads to resist the dye.
The saga will continue in upcoming months.
October 29, 2017 – Planning the ikat warp
Today some of us started planning our ikat warps under the experienced eye of Frank and with the help of the instructions that can be found here. Some of us used a warping board and some used a frame, but the challenge came in twining around designated bundles of warp threads that will be wrapped to exclude the dye. Next month we will proceed to the next step.
October 27, 2017 – Madder Matters
For some time we have had access to madder root to use to make a lovely red dye. Phyllis bought a single madder plant some years ago and it has turned into a fairly sizable madder patch that is occasionally dug and the roots used to create the dye. Some of the plant material is returned to the patch, sprouts, and the cycle starts anew. But Phyllis is moving to a new location. So the madder is being relocated to a garden patch in the Santa Cruz Mountains. Today Phyllis helped search through the recently dug madder and selected some chunks of dirt that contained minuscule root shoots. These have now been incorporated into a bed about 4×9 feet. Will they take hold and sprout in their new locale? Only time will tell.
September 17, 2017 – Starting our ikat project
Frank presented a detailed, hands-on overview on how to get started on a project that will continue for a few months. Ikat is a dyeing technique used to pattern textiles. Bundles of warp threads are tied securely before they are woven so that they will resist dye when they are immersed in a dye bath. The ties are then removed before being put on a loom. This produces patterns in the cloth made with the undyed areas of threads. It is a time-consuming technique used by a number of cultures.
Frank had a warp that he has created that is ready to dye. In the photo the areas that look red and purple are warp threads that are tied together with red and purple plastic tape that is designed to keep dye from the threads. These areas will remain white when the warp is immersed in a dye bathe. The frame is simply a way of holding the threads taut so they can be tied with this tape in a pattern that the weaver would like to leave undyed. The warp threads will be removed from the frame, dyed, and then the tape will be removed before they are threaded onto a loom for weaving.
The process of putting the warp on the frame and tying the bundles is complex and exacting. We spent much time learning how it was done and planning projects to create. More will be happening in the next months.
This is a video of member Phyllis Karsten tying a piece of plastic resist onto a bundle of yarn:
[wpvideo oyff4ha1 w=400]