Mirrix Press Presents TAPESTRY/BEAD CUFF BRACELET BY CLAUDIA CHASE • CHAPTER 1 • GETTING STARTED What you need: -A pair of scissors -A Mirrix Loom (preferably size 12 or larger with a shedding device) and all that comes with one. -A bead mat (optional) -A ten-dent spring (if you do NOT have one we can work with a twelve-dent spring by stretching it but we do recommend having one). Remember having a ten-dent spring means that there are ten dents (spaces in the warp coil) in an inch when on the loom. -Glue that can bond fabric to metal. These types of glue are available through craft outlets. You will only need this for finishing your cuff. -A tapestry/bead cuff bracelet kit (or similar materials: Yarn (for example: silk, rayon floss, perle cotton, novelty yarns); A spool of beading cord; beading thread, a brass cuff; a piece of ultra suede; size 8/0 and 11/0 seed beads) -Heddles To make them yourself: You will need to make as many individual heddles as there will be warps in your weaving. These heddles (as well as the Mirrix heddles you can buy) will be reusable. The thinner and stronger the string you use, the better. For bead weavers, cotton quilting or beading thread works great. For tapestry weavers, cotton crochet thread, linen warp or single-ply cotton warp works well. Nail two finishing nails into a piece of wood three and one-eight inches apart. You will use this little tool to tie your warps. Cut ten inch lengths of your heddle material, one for each heddle you will make. Tie them around the nails, using an overhand knot to secure the ends. In order to get that knot to sit right next to the nail, slip a needle into the knot before it is pulled tight and push the knot toward the nail. Then tighten it. Trim off the ends of the heddles to within a quarter of an inch of the knot.) -A needle (or needles) -A Phillips head screw driver IF you have wooden clips How you want to set up your work space is up to you, but we suggest f inding a f lat surface and organizing ever ything y o u w i l l n e e d t o w a r p t h e l o o m a n d b e g i n we av i n g . S w i n g out the two (or one if you are using an 8" loom) legs under the loom and place it on a f lat surface. M a ke s u r e y o u r l o o m i s a t a h e i g h t s o y o u h ave a b o u t 2 " o f threaded rod showing on each side. Measure to make sure t h e l o o m i s e v e n . We s u g g e s t i f y o u a r e u s i n g a s i z e 12 " l o o m o r l a rge r t h a t y o u p u t y o u r we av i n g o n t h e l e f t o r r i g h t s i d e o f t h e l o o m . Yo u w i l l n e e d s o m e k i n d o f s t r i n g t o t i e a r o u n d the warping bar on the opposite side of where you will put y o u r p i e c e . Yo u w i l l d o t h i s a f t e r y o u h a v e w a r p e d y o u r l o o m . I t w i l l h e l p t o s t a b i l i z e t h e w a r p i n g b a r. T h e r e a s o n you don't put it in the middle of the loom is, because it is s u c h a t h i n p i e c e , i t i s d i f f i c u l t t o b a l a n c e t h e b a r. Yo u m a y want to warp the loom on both sides and make another piece on the other side at a later date.The tapestry/bead cuff bracelet cuffs come with enough extra yarn to make another piece. For the tapestr y/bead cuff you will warp your loom for tapestry rather than bead we av i n g ( t h i s m e a n s o n e warp in each dent instead of two). Please refer to our online warping instr uctions for detailed directions on warping your loom.CLICK HERE Yo u c a n a l s o r e f e r t o t h e instructions that came with your tapestry/bead cuff b r a c e l e t k i t i f y o u h ave o n e . Yo u w i l l n e e d t o w a r p f i f t e e n dents across for this project. •Warping • Following are pictures and brief explanations of how to warp for this project (if you have never warped before you will still want to refer to the warping instructions). First, place the warping bar between the two clips (turn the clips backwards and push them in slightly to hold the warping bar while warping. (Note: There is a bottom spring kit on this loom, although one is not necessary for this project. A bottom spring kit is used to organize your warps and is especially useful when weaving wide bead pieces or small-scale tapestry pieces.) Loom with warping bar in place Warped loom The tapestry/bead cuff bracelet is a relatively thin project, so we suggest warping your piece on one side of the loom. When you are done warping, tie a piece of cord (any string can be used) on the other side of the loom to keep the warping bar to keep balanced. Alternatively, you can warp another piece on the other side to weave later. The top of the loom, 15 warps across 2 Loom with warp on it. The cord on the right side helps balance the warping bar (which has been pulled down lower on the loom). Next, place the shedding device in your wooden (or plastic) clips (turning them around so they stick forward) and begin putting heddles on. Heddles attach the warp threads to the shedding device, allowing you to change sheds when you change the position of the shedding device handle. 3 The loom, warped and with heddles on both sides of the shedding device. The loom, ready to be woven on with the shedding device handle attached. Close-up of heddles attached to shedding device 4 •Weaving a Header • Once the shedding device is put on the loom, all you have to do is engage the shedding device(the shedding device raises half the warps) and place your weft between those warps. (When you are doing this, make sure your weft ends face the back of the piece, this can be accomplished either by wrapping your end around so it faces back or by starting your weft in the middle of the piece.) Then, change the shed by moving the shedding device into the other position (and therefore raising the other half of the warps) and weave through the raised and lowered warps again. 5 • CHAPTER 2 • WEAVING There are many different tapestry techniques you can use when weaving a cuff, but if you are a beginner you may want to just begin with straight lines. One of the difficult things about weaving tapestry is that there is a tendency to "pull in", which means you pull your edges in too tight making the edges (or "selvages") of the piece not straight. This piece makes keeping your selvages straight easy, both because it is thin and because the rows of beads help space the piece. If you haven't woven tapestry before, do some research: http://www.americantapestryalliance.org/ http://www.tapestrywine.blogspot.com/ http://www.canadiantapestrynetwork.com/ • Beginning to Weave • To Start Picture your final product: Because these cuffs seem to look awesome no matter what, we often weave them with no solid plan. But, some of you may want to decide what you will weave before you begin. You may want to decide on some basic design elements before you begin. For example, do you want to put in beads in regular increments or randomly? Do you want to have stripes? What types of tapestry techniques so you want to use? Choose your colors (and your materials): If you have a tapestry/bead cuff bracelet kit purchased from us, you have a variety of hand-dyed silk and other yarns to choose from when making your cuff. Before you begin weaving, take a look at what colors you have available and try to decide what ones you want to use. If you do not have a kit purchased from us, decide on what types of yarn you want to use as well as what colors. 7 Begin weaving: The concept of tapestry weaving in this format is very simple. You engage the shedding device (just like you did when weaving your header) and weave in between the raised and lowered threads. We recommend starting your weft threads in the middle of the piece instead of on the edges so your ends are all facing the back (if you don't, make sure to wrap the ends around so they do face the back). Weave through once, change the position of the shedding device and then weave through again. Continue doing this. You can mix colors (two silks together make a gorgeous pattern), mix different types of yarn (the silk and novelty railroad yarn look great together) or just stick with solid stripes. We will discuss different tapestry you can use soon! 8 Add Beads Thread tied in a loop threaded through a needle. Using beads is what makes the tapestry/bead cuff bracelet unique. The beads are actually woven into the cuff on whatever you are using for weft. The first step to doing this is to take a piece of beading thread (as you know, we use C-Lon thread) and tie a loop of it onto a needle. You will then put your weft thread (let's say you having been weaving with yellow silk, you will put that piece of silk through the loop you made with the beading thread and then put 14 size 8.0 beads on the needle, moving them over the loop and onto the silk (or whatever your weft thread is, make sure it is thin enough to put the beads on it.) The beads on the yellow silk. 9 Next, (making sure you remembered to change sheds) place the beads on the silk between the spaces in the warp threads. They should fit exactly (this is why it is important to have the ten dent spring... spacing matters a lot when you are using beads in tapestry). Then, continue weaving with the same thread. Keep experimenting mixing fibers and adding beads. 10 Tapestry Techniques Definitions 1. Selvages: The four sides of your piece. 2. Warp interlock: When the two ends of weft meet at a warp thread and wrap around that thread before changing direction. Tapestry Techniques If you're interested in better explanations of tapestry techniques or want to learn tapestry, we suggest you purchase a book. Kathe ToddHooker's book, "Tapestry 101" and "Tapestry Weaving" by Kirsten Glasbrook are both great books for beginners with lots of detail and easyto-follow instructions. 11 Tapestry techniques we're trying today: Pick and Pick, Wavy Lines, Hatching. A Short Explanation of Pick and Pick and Wavy Lines Both of these techniques require that you alternate the weaving of two different color threads. In pick and pick, you alternate them one after another. In other words, thread one, thread two, thread one, thread two, etc.. Wavy line technique requires that you weave thread one twice, thread two twice, thread one twice, thread two twice. Pick and pick produces vertical stripes, whereas wavy lines produces the effect of wavy lines. These two have in common the necessity to deal with the selvages in a slightly unusual manner. You will have to manage these two threads in a way that will guarantee the selvage thread has enough weft around it.In the first case, depending on the position of your threads you will have to wrap one of your weft threads around the selvage thread in order to guarantee complete coverage. In the second case, the top thread will pull the second thread and by doing so the top thread will cover the selvage thread twice. These techniques take some time to master but are well worth the effort. If you're feeling intimidated, it is by no means necessary to use these techniques in your cuff but we do suggest you try the hatching technique (described last) at the very least. 12 Pick and Pick First line of yellow. In our example, we've used magenta and a golden yellow to begin our pick and pick. We alternate the colors thereby creating vertical stripes. In other words, weave the yellow thread once, and then the magenta thread once (making sure to change sheds every time you weave a new thread) then the yellow, then the magenta, etc... Follow the pictures for a visual of what we did: Second line of magenta (refer back to learn how to deal with your edges). Remember to change your shed every time you bring a thread across. 13 To continue with this design, but to add something extra, we stopped the magenta in the middle of the piece and started a purple thread at that place, thereby replacing the magenta with the purple. This allows us to continue the design but with a different color scheme. You could theoretically keep replacing threads as they run out with new ones for the entire bracelet and allow that to be your design. One way to approach this would be continue with the yellow thread and only replace the other ones. That would give you the most interesting effect. This kit may not include enough of any one shade of one color to do that, but we wanted to give you an idea of future design possibilities. We switched to using green after the purple thread as an example of this. Notice the beautiful vertical s tripes emerging. Changing the color to purple. 14 Wa v y L i n e s The first pass through with green. Wavy lines are very similar to pick and pick but instead of making one pass with a color, you make two passes creating what looks like wavy lines. Here, we started with two passes weaving with green, then two with yellow, then two with green, etc... Follow the pictures to see what we did: 15 16 Hatching This technique also involves two threads but the left thread will stay on the left and the right thread will stay on the right. In a full scale tapestry this is a great way to blend two colors together to create shading. This technique also involves warp interlock because when the two ends meet at a warp thread they each wrap around it before changing direction. The yellow and blue thread heading toward each other. The way hatching works: The two threads will come meet each other at any place within the tapestry you would like. The threads must be woven toward each other. They will then wrap around a common warp thread and head away from each other in the next shed. These two colors will dovetail into each other. A lot of other techniques can spring from this one including adding additional colors. For now and for such a small piece we suggest you keep it simple and just use two colors. Wrap the two threads around the common warp, change sheds and head in opposite directions. 17 A visual of the threads wrapping around a common warp. 18 Remember that these techniques can take some time to master. Play around! Have fun! You can see here how the dovetailing is beginning to reveal itself! 19 Finishing Techniques Remember: Weave your tapestry until the inner section (excluding header and footer) is seven inches. Yes, this is a tad more length than you need. However, whenever we have gotten impatient and skimped on length, we have found our pieces are just a tiny bit short, making finishing a nightmare. So, better longer than shorter and better safe than sorry because there is nothing worse weaving wise to create a beautiful piece that cannot be finished because it's too short. 20 Cut your piece off the loom. Cut as near to the bar as possible. This is most important for the bottom warps as you need them to be at least four inches in length in order to easily tie overhand knots. Begin on one side of the piece by tying the first part of a half hitch knot. Weight one end of piece with something heavy. You can use bricks, books . . . whatever is handy. This allows you to tie the knots on the other end. Pull half-hitch knot until it is flush with weaving. 21 Tighten knot with needle inserted. Push needle toward weaving. This will tighten the knot but not allow it to tighten before you've reached the weaving. Make an overhand knot. Tie all knots on that side. Since you have an odd number of warps you will need to make one of the knots three warps: one warp tied to two warps. Trim knots so they are about a quarter inches plus long. Insert a needle in knot. 22 Trim tails on back of weaving so that they are about half an inch long. Fold over end of piece to back of piece and sew with a whip stitch. Size piece to metal cuff to decide hem placement. Size piece again to determine second hem. 23 Glue ultra suede to inside of cuff. We use E6000 but any glue that bonds fabric to metal is fine. You will be sewing the two lawyers together (the ultra suede and the tapestry) so this bond is not one that permanently holds the fabric to the cuff, but one that holds it in place while you sew up the edges. Trim the edges of the ultra suede so that you have about an eighth an inch on all sides. Don't worry if this is not perfect. When you sew the edges to the weaving all errors will be covered up. Do not over trim. Err on the wide of too much, not too little, fabric. While you are sewing you can trim a little more if need be. As in every case with this piece, more is better. Less can cause huge problems. 24 Put glue on back of weaving. Push the strands of yarn inward and try to calm them down with the glue. This makes glueing this piece to the cuff much easier because those stray ends will not be poking out all over the place . Glue tapestry to cuff. 25 Start at a corner of the cuff. Pull your thread through the back of the tapestry to the front. Then start whip stitching the ultra-sued and tapestry together. 26 Once you are finished sewing the two edges together you can add your beads! Bury the end of a new thread inside the cuff. Pick up three beads. Whip stitch around the edge of the tapestry and the ultra-suede. Continue around the whole piece until finished. You can add more than three beads if you like. The goal is to cover the stitching and to make the piece looked finished and beautiful. However you get there is your own personal and lovely touch. 27 The Finished Cuff L e t Yo u r I m a g i n a t i o n Run Wild! There are endless variations of these cuffs... experiment and have fun! 28 Credits • By Claudia Chase & Elena Zuyok of Mirrix Looms • © Mirrix Tapestry & Bead Looms 2012 www.mirrixlooms.com xxix
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