Island Time

Tapestry Weavers South  celebrated a milestone tonight, twenty years!  Twenty eight weavers gathered on St. Simons Island Thursday for a three day retreat.

A beautiful setting to relax and connect with new friends and old.  

Lots of looms, lots of weavers and lots of inspiration.  As the retreat was a celebration there was plenty of time to visit with one another and weave.  The coolest thing about the weekend was getting to meet in "real life" weavers whose work you admired and facebook and blog friends.

Connie Lippert gave a talk on wedge weave.

Jon Eric Riis critiqued submitted work and gave us constructive feedback.

This portrait of a cocker spaniel by MJ Lord exuded joy.

Jon examines a finely woven piece by Molly Elkind.

Norsk Fjord Fiber's Sidsel  Moreb discusses her tapestry with Jon.

Sarah shared her approach to establishing and maintaining a daily tapestry practice.

This wonderful piece is by Pat Williams and one of my favorites.

This is Urban Decay by Betty Hilton-Nash.  Jon pointed out this tapestry looked great from every angle.

The three founding members of Tapestry Weavers South.  Pat Williams,  Tommye Scanlin and Holly Wilkes.

Tomorrow we will wrap up this retreat, say fond farewells and resume our mostly electronic communications.   There has been such a great deal of information and inspiration shared this weekend and we all need to get back to the studio and weave!

Filament - New Work from TWS

A small group of tapestry weavers created Tapestry Weavers South in the late
 1990s.  Tapestry Weavers from all over the southeast United States joined together to promote the artistry of tapestry.  On Saturday, May 6th at the Yadkin Cultural Arts Center Filaments, the new tapestry show opened.

Here are a few of the pieces from the show.
Betty Hilton-Nash  and Leslie Fesperson did a wonderful job of hanging the show.

Below are some pictures of the artists with their work at our most recent TWS meeting.

It was a pleasure to be part of this show and even better is being a member of this group.  Tommye Scanlon gave an inspiring talk about the process of weaving tapestry.  You can enjoy it here. TWS Filament.

Rust Dyeing

In an effort to not feel left out by skipping the Maryland Sheep and Wool festival a few of us got together for fiber pursuits.

First up, was some rust dyeing.  We wrapped some rusty bits in silk scarf blanks and then simmered the scarves in a pot of yellow onion skins overnight.

I tried a new to me technique using steel wool.  I got the idea from here.  Whenever I dye anything I start by washing it in Synthrapol.  With rust dyeing there is no need to pre-mordant.

The materials needed are basic, gloves, an empty wine bottle, a package of steel wool, some string or rubber bands, white vinegar and water.

1.  Wear gloves, the steel wool can cause small cuts on your hands.  I might have learned this the hard way.

2.  Unfold the steel wool into long strips and wrap around the wine bottle.

3.  Take the wet scarf and wrap it in a spiral up to the neck of the wine bottle.

4.  Secure with rubber bands or string.  I used an old rusty strip of metal.

5.  Place the bottle down in a bucket and spray with solution of 50% water and 50% white vinegar.  Try to saturate all parts of the bottle.

6.  Let sit 24 hours and then unwrap.  Following the instructions on other sites the first scarf I let sit for 4 days, spraying it each night with additional water and vinegar.  Unfortunately, the silk had a few holes where the rust "ate" through the fabric.  The second scarf I left wrapped for only 24 hours and it was intact with good rust printing.

I then folded the scarves between two blocks of wood and gave them a quick dip into the indigo pot.  Easy as pie!