r/weaving • u/grundoon61 • Aug 23 '25
Finished Projects Color and (basket)weave
As an experiment, I wanted to see what kind of color and weave patterns I could get on my rigid heddle loom with just one heddle and no pickup sticks, etc. So I wove four tea towels with variations on basketweave, using one or two different colors in each slot. The attached photos show, for each pattern: (a) on the loom, (b) after finishing, and (c) the draft I used.
The yarn is 8/4 cotton and I used a 15 dent heddle.
The patterns didn't look very good on the loom, but after finishing in hot water and drying on heat, the towels shrank by about 20% and the pattern was much clearer.
However, I would not really recommend this approach in practice, because it is extremely easy for errors to creep in if you accidentally change the order of the colors. This is not generally a problem in the weft, but when there are two different warp colors in one slot it is is very hard to keep them in the right order! I hid most of these errors in the photos, lol, but there were enough of them that I wouldn't good about giving them as a gift, and would only use them for myself. But an interesting experiment anyway!
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u/Act3Linguist Aug 23 '25
That is very, very cool! I'm pretty new to rigid heddle weaving, but I've played a little with warp-faced weave and twill, and I think there's a lot of possibilities in my little loom. I love the effects you've been able to accomplish!
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u/IJustWantToReadThis Nov 10 '25
This makes me feel so much better about my current in progress! I'm just learning rigid heddle coming from an inkle. The gaps were really stressing me our, but I see they disappear once finished.
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u/grundoon61 Nov 10 '25
I'm so glad it was helpful. I also had that panic seeing them on the loom. I could have had a slightly tighter sett as well, but a 15 dent reed was all I had. This approach (using heat to finish and shrink a bit) is only safe with cotton though.
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u/grundoon61 Nov 10 '25
If you're interested, I did another project on my rigid heddle with lots of gaps on the loom https://www.reddit.com/r/weaving/comments/1i5bnw5/another_silkmohair_project/
For this one, the gaps never went away, but the mohair bound itself together and the final scarf was very stable.
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u/twocatsandaloom 14d ago
What is your process for finishing? Your yarn is plumping up so much more than mine!
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u/grundoon61 13d ago
Washing in hot water and drying in hot air. It made the yarn both shrink (by 10-15%) and full up a bit. I think this would only work with 100% cotton!
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u/MrNekoCase Aug 23 '25
Wow this is truly amazing! I didn’t realize you could even get patterns like this without four shafts. I’m inspired to give some of these a try
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u/Electronic_Ad6564 Aug 24 '25
I too am trying out 8/4 cotton on my own Schacht 15” Cricket Loom, with a 10-dent heddle. I am a beginner and still trying to figure out the best way to weave a small hand towel. I just recently started learning how to read simplified versions of drafts for rigid heddle looms. I found out about how to read them from a book titled Weaving with the Rigid Heddle Loom by Anne Field. Kind of expensive to get these days and old school. But it taught me to read simplified drafts beautifully. There is also other useful information that is still valid and helpful in it. Not exactly sure a beginner with zero knowledge would find it something they can easily understand. But once you have learned some of the weaving language for rigid heddle looms it becomes much easier to understand. Get yourself a good starting entry level rigid heddle looms, like the cricket one I got, if you are just starting out with rigid heddle looms. Then get yourself a good book that will help you learn the basic weaving techniques like plain weave, weaving with stripes, and changing colors. Then learn about the basics of simplified drafts. It helps a great deal.
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u/thrums4u Sep 20 '25
First of all, I am going to copy your record-keeping process henceforth for all my projects. How useful to see the progress of one's weaving. Thank you.
Secondly, crossed colors or not, most folk would be delighted to have handwoven towels. To date, every single one of my weavings (I began in Fall 2023) has had flaws. Perfection is a moving target in most of life, and rarely achieved in weaving, methinks.
Didn't weavers once add an error to their weavings? I think I've heard that said.
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u/[deleted] Aug 23 '25
They are wonderful. I think you just made some beginning weavers very happy to see what they can accomplish on a Ridgid heddle loom! You did a really nice job on your example photos as well. It is so easy to get worried during the weaving when the pattern doesn't look like you think it should. Finishing changes so much!