During the January meeting of Marlborough Weavers, we were informed the 2007 theme would be M's & O's; weave something for yourself (or someone else) in this structure and bring it (or a photograph) to the last meeting's show and tell. Sounded easy enough.Well, that last meeting is next Monday.
All year I've been reading about M's & O's, but I just can't get my head around it. I'm fine with the threading, but something about the treadling, or the concept of blocks (where one lot is doing something while the other is doing something different) boggles this tiny mind. In addition, since I joined the Cross Country Weavers sample exchange, I've had it my head that I need to create something using 10+ shafts whenever these "assignments" are handed down.
I've consulted over a dozen books trying to understand the structure, either by reading the explanation, or gazing at several dozen drafts. I've played with my software. I've looked at woven samples. Yesterday, in my desperation, I brought out the heavy artillery, graph paper, pen, scissors and glue, (for old-fashioned cut-and-paste.) And I'm still none the wiser.
The only options I can think of are 1) use blocks of different width to create squares and rectangles adjacent to complementary weave structures - kind of a textural check, but this can be done on 4-shafts, or 2) a kind of Christmas Tree-shaped design where small blocks are used to create a large shape, using up to 16, but this would result in a textile mostly in plain weave or cords. Or 3) take a draft out of a book and weave it. I did this twice in my past.
My mind is completely blank today. The always-reliable Marguerite Davison book had some simple but beautiful drafts; many of her drafts mix the plain weave treadling to create not just a two-block textile, but to make an interesting-looking cloth. So I'm absent-mindedly admiring the pages of her book today. Come to think of it, the two times I took a draft straight out of a book were I wove two undulating twills from her book.
I don't know if I'm just too tired, or I'm so bad at multi-tasking (which I am!) I can't comprehend blocks in different weaves.
Oh, there is Option 4) bow out of the sample and take a yummy treat instead.
2 comments:
I found this post by googling "m's & o's" as I need to come up with something simple for my next guild meeting. I read your post and chuckled. I could have written something almost identical myself!
Hello, Leigh. You know, I did bow out and baked cake, too!
Of all the projects weavers brought to the meeting, though, the one I liked the best was one of the Davison drafts, but she wove it in spaced-and-crammed arrangement of some sort. I thought I had photographed it but I came home and found I didn't.
It was very simple, but effective, and just goes to show I was a little too greedy there.
Humble pie!
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