Tien Chiu

  • Home
  • About Tien
    • Honors, Awards, and Publications
  • Online Teaching
  • Gallery
  • Essays
  • Travels
  • Book
  • Blog
  • Dye samples
You are here: Home / All blog posts / Hearts
Previous post: Off to Maryland!
Next post: No longer a novice

May 2, 2009 by Tien Chiu Leave a Comment

Hearts

Today I had the dubious experience of spending 9 hours on a plane, as we attempted to fly from San Jose to Dallas, Texas.  We got to Dallas, but major thunderstorms prevented us from landing, and we diverted to San Antonio.  We refueled there and started for Dallas again, but more thunderstorms developed and we had to turn back to San Antonio again.  After we landed for the second time (and FINALLY got to a gate…we had been on the plane that entire time), the airline decided to ground the plane for the night and start back up again in the morning.  So, after nine hours on a plane, I stood in line with my fellow passengers for an hour and a half to get a hotel voucher, then another forty-five minutes to get into registration at the hotel.  Now I’m in the hotel, and in a few scant hours I’ll have to be up again for the flight, which leaves at the jaw-dropping hour of 6am (meaning I have to leave the hotel at around 4am).

So why am I blogging at this hour?  Well, I did some interesting stuff on the flight, and I thought I’d share.  I was thinking about the draft for the dress (underneath the coat).  It’ll be in 60/2 silk, so I’m assuming the sett will be somewhere between 50 and 75 epi, meaning a 60-70 thread repeat will give me a motif about 1″ square.  Clearly a straight draw won’t do (though a point threading might).  So I was thinking about advancing twills.

In Twill Thrills: The Best of Weaver’s, there’s a pattern for an 8-shaft advancing twill heart.  I pulled that pattern out, altered it until I got an effect I liked, and then turned it into a 16-shaft version with the hearts alternating on a half drop:

8 shaft advancing twill heart, alternated in 2 blocks to make a 16-shaft draft
8 shaft advancing twill heart, alternated in 2 blocks to make a 16-shaft draft

That was OK, but I didn’t like the way the hearts were getting cut off at the bottom.  I looked at the draft and realized that it was the twill advance that was doing it, so I expanded the base pattern to 12 shafts and mucked around with the threading/tie-up until I got something I liked considerably better:

A 12-shaft advancing twill heart, alternated on the half drop
A 12-shaft advancing twill heart, alternated on the half drop

I like this one considerably better and am contemplating weaving it up.

Another strong possibility is a draft that Sharon Alderman showed me, which is a series of weft ribs over a plainweave ground cloth.  I managed to locate the draft for the cloth she originally designed sometime during the nine hours on the plane, but didn’t have the mental stamina by that point to puzzle out how to extend the method to do arbitrary patterns.  So I will tackle that tomorrow.

Meanwhile, good night.  The alarm clock goes off at 3:30am, and hopefully this time I will get to Maryland!

Share this post!

  • Tweet
  • More
  • Click to share on Reddit (Opens in new window) Reddit
  • Click to email a link to a friend (Opens in new window) Email
  • Share on Tumblr
  • Click to print (Opens in new window) Print

Like this:

Like Loading...

Discover more from Tien Chiu

Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.

Filed Under: All blog posts, textiles, weaving Tagged With: wedding dress

Previous post: Off to Maryland!
Next post: No longer a novice

Leave a ReplyCancel reply

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.

Archives

Tags

aids lifecycle outfits autumn splendor book cashmere coat cats celtic braid coat color study cross dyeing design design class devore doubleweave doubleweave shawls drawing dye samples dye study group gradient colors house infinite warp jacquard loom katazome knitted blanks kodachrome jacket ma's memorial mohair coat network drafted jacket/shawl project network drafting painted warp phoenix rising phoenix rising dress phoenix rising kimono phoenix rising reloaded pre-weavolution project sea turtles taquete tie-dye tied weaves tomatoes velvet weaving drafts web design website redesign wedding wedding dress woven shibori

Categories

  • Africa
  • aids lifecycle
  • All blog posts
  • All travel posts
  • Asia
  • Bangkok
  • Belize
  • Cambodia
  • Central America
  • Chai Ya (Wat Suon Mok)
  • Chiang Mai
  • Chiang Rai (Akha)
  • China
  • chocolate
  • computer stuff
  • creating craft
  • Creative works
  • cycling
  • Delhi
  • Dharamsala
  • drawing
  • dyeing
  • Fiber Arts
  • finished
  • food
  • garden
  • Ghana
  • Guatemala
  • Hanoi
  • Ho Chi Minh City
  • Hoi An
  • India
  • Khao Lak
  • Knitting
  • knitting
  • Ko Chang
  • Laos
  • Luang Namtha
  • Luang Prabang
  • markleeville death ride
  • meditations on craft
  • mental illness
  • musings
  • Phnom Penh
  • powerlifting
  • Rewalsar (Tso Pema)
  • sewing
  • Siem Reap (Angkor Wat)
  • Southeast Asia
  • surface design
  • textiles
  • Thailand
  • travel
  • Vangvieng
  • Vientiane
  • Vietnam
  • Warp & Weave
  • weaving
  • Weaving
  • weavolution
  • writing

© Copyright 2025 Tien Chiu · All Rights Reserved ·

 

Loading Comments...
 

    %d