TEXTILES SAMPLES AT MY STUDIO.

Today Sunday I am sitting at my studio working on a project at my loom.

I have been looking through a samplebook I start making many years ago, when I was working in Italy. I got the oppertunity to work in Como and Prato.
This sample is my favorite of all I have. It is woven in silk on a jacquard loom.
Sometimes I use the textile samples for inspiration or just as today to look at, as they are so beautiful.
Some of the pattern (the thick threads) are made in deflected weave technique.

I like the combination of thick and thin and how simple a pattern can be made when working with this.

Two samples in black / white. The first in very thin cotton, complex and woven on a jacquard loom. The other in thick wool. Both are interesting and could be used for interior as curtain and blankets.

The last three I have chosen to show is ideal for upholstery.
I like to look through my samplebooks, both with my own woven textiles and here old ones, as there are a richness of surfaces, structures and tactility.

WEAVING WITH THE FAN REED.

In 1998 when I did an exchange to the Philadelphia College of Textiles & Science, I came across these beautiful samples at a little museum, which were connected to the college.
The samples are all woven with a fan reed, some also call it ondulé. In Japan this kind of reed is called YOROKE. There are different kinds of ideas behind these two reeds, and therefore for me it is the fan reed I weave with.
I took these pictures, and as you can see there are diffenrent kinds of possibilities depending on how you set up the threads on the loom.

It was first many years later I start weaving with the fan reed, after my graduation from the Danish School of Design in 2000.

I have three fan reeds with different settings and is therefore able to use diffenrent kinds of thick and thin yarns for the warp material.

My first fan reed I got it from an old man, whose wife had past away. Here I am able to use very fine and thin yarns. In the middle of the reed the setting are 70/10. This means there are 70 holes per each 10 cm.

Another reed where the setting are 30/10.

And finally the last one which I have had made specially for me. My idea was to make a mix of the 70/10 and 30/10 in the same reed. When taking contact to the place in Sweden where I have had the 30/10 made, they told me it was impossible to make the reed as I wanted. Fortunately I found another place who could make the reed and because this one is much more difficult to make the price became much higher.

When working with the fan reed, this can be woven on an ordinary contramarch loom. I have put this extra equipment on my loom. This means I can change the positions of where the warp threads are in the reed. It is also possible to make the changement of the warp threads if you have a loom with a lot of holes in the beater. Both of these two takes time to weave, but the result you get is stunning and is worth the effort you put in to the work.

The threads are in the lower part of the reed when you beat the weft threads together.

And here in the top part of the reed.

A close-up of my first room divider I wove with the fan reed. The material are polyester and monofilament. The technique is gauze.

Another friend of mine Anne Selim weave beautiful scarfs with the fan reed.