Old Bar beach is a bit unusual on the coastline of NSW in Australia.  Its incredible cover of stones seem to come from the nearby Manning River, and they gather everywhere then disappear for a few days. Everyone who comes to the studio comments on them. Old Bar Beach is a beachcomber’s delight. The thing with the stones is that they are all so different. With this double weave piece I just had to focus on one shade of the stones but there are plenty of others. How did they all get so, so different. 

I know stones happen on other beaches and I certainly saw an overload on Brighton Beach in the UK. But on the coast of NSW the sands vary dramatically from beach to beach but there isn’t much in the way of  stones happening. South of Sydney the sand is super fine and white, in some of the Northern Sydney beaches the sand is orange and full of shell grit. Here we have lovely whiteish sands AND stones.

On the loom the weaving was slow and exacting and easy to make a mistake. It is a 24 shaft double weave which was threaded over time. And this was the last time the design was on the loom in 2009!  This post outlines it’s original intent and inspiration. So it’s been a long time in the pipeline. The good thing about this type of work is it takes a long time to get the design established, although not usually 10 years!  But once that’s right I can then weave and weave. On the minus side is the physical energy needed to weave this work, it takes alot and isn’t the usual pleasant sitting at a loom, it’s work.  The energy take up is good for anger though! I can never sell this type of work because of the cost, at least in Australia, despite the art that it is. So it’s ok to take my time and not look at it as a production, which it isn’t.

Most of the magic in this weave is the fine lycra/wool weft in one of the layers. This makes everything buckle up and the fabric has a stretch factor to it. Finally I’m very happy with this piece and I can look at the next one which will pick up on other stones of Old Bar Beach.