Textile arts in planes is a real dilemma. I’ve been trying to come up with something, I’ve brought plastic crochet hooks and circular knitting needles such as the resin Denise needles but there is still a chance that these will be confiscated on the day and I don’t want to leave it up to chance.
So I think that Finger weaving might be the way to go. It only requires a small piece of dowel yarn, and possibly a safety pin which I will have to forego. The other advantage of this weaving is that a separate weft thread for the weaving process isn’t needed. The pre-organised warp is also the weft! A 15cm(6″) piece of dowel is recommended, but I shortened this so that it sat more comfortably between my knees. I even thought of sewing a sort of ‘pouch’ for the dowel that wraps around my legs.

The technique is very simple but also difficult! As most weavers know, the least amount of equipment used for weaving, the more difficult the task and more skilled the weaver must be. This is true with finger weaving. Picking up the alternate sheds by hand and maintaining a firm tension requires skillful dexterity. I learnt this technique from a lovely little book called Finger Weaving: Indian Braiding But a much more detailed anaysis is in A Manual of Fingerweaving This book is very interesting but I found the instructions difficult to comprehend at times.

There is information on the net on how to fingerweave such as this Chevron pattern which includes some historical information on the ceinture fléchée or arrowhead sash. This author uses a woollen yarn to begin, and I think this is easier to use than the 5/2 mercericed cotton that I am using.

Trackback URI | Comments RSS