Back from my Yarrawonga Saori weave adventure. What a fantastic and exhilarating three days in North West Victoria. With generous hospitality and enthusiasm for the workshop I met lots of new people and learnt more about how others approach weaving and design.  I was thrilled with the resulting textiles, all entirely different and unique to each participant. I also got to see some of the finished pieces which I don’t normally as washing is done after the workshop. Washing or finishing a textile really makes it ‘right’ like baking a cake mixture. In the washing you see the unexpected fulling, slippage, compaction or textural highlights.

The organisation of the workshop was astounding as I wasn’t able to supply looms via the plane trip. Twelve looms, all foot powered, were pre-warped ready for weavers on each of the two Saori workshop days. Some were small handlooms. These were converted to foot looms by the addition of a pedal stand purpose built by Dianne. Some participants lent their looms for the workshop. Each loom was tied to only two foot pedals in a plain weave  threading (even when the threading was distributed over 4 shafts). Boat shuttles were provided for everyone, with bobbins and bobbin winding tools for the rhythm factor.  There was also a yarn wall to make yarn selection easy and to suggest some colour mixing or combinations in a directly visual way.

The final day of the workshop was a warp painting and easy ikat day. Once again the space provided was very large and brilliantly organised. Dianne and Bev wound 24 white warps for dyeing so this could expediate the day’s work. Which it did!

Unfortunately I didn’t take as many photos of what I should have so my record lies in my head and memories rather than on screen but perhaps that is the way it should be. The following photos are only a small sampling of the exquisite work on the day.

Thank you to all participants. The workshop left me on a high which is difficult to shake. I just love weaving and meeting new people, in case it wasn’t obvious.