I’m itching to get this 25-yard warp off the loom, so I’ve been plotting projects to use up some of it. We don’t really have enough place mats, and we certainly don’t have handwoven napkins, so I doodled up this place mat design using clip art licensed for noncommercial use:
While they’re not going to win design awards, the design is quite striking, and I think will make a fun set of place mats. I’ll likely weave the place mats as stitched double weave, and also do a matching set of napkins in single-layer cloth. To avoid wasting warp, I’ll weave two placemats at once, side by side, and weave two napkins at once, one on top of the other. That will use up about 24″ of warp for each pair of place mats and 24″ of warp for each pair of napkins, so each set of six place mats and napkins will use up 4 yards of warp. Hmm, perhaps I should weave a few more as gifts…I’m sure my friends and relatives would love them!
The place mats should also be a fun technical challenge. Since they need to be woven side by side, I need to construct a weave structure that will lift first one side, then the other. I don’t think that’s hard but it will take some figuring, which should be fun! I also need to make that structure a stitched double weave to hold the layers of the place mat together – again, not too hard, but complicated enough to add some interesting challenge to the design process.
Similarly, for the napkins, I’ll need to design them to be woven as top and bottom layers. I think that will be easier, though.
I’ve decided that my goal for the New Year will be to start keeping a sketchbook, and make entries in the sketchbook at least once a day. Curiously, there doesn’t appear to be sketchbook software that does everything I want it to – draw images, flip rapidly through pages, search text in images, etc. So I’m going to create the sketchbook pages in Photoshop (or on my iPad if I’m not at home), save each page as a .jpg file, and then dump the .jpgs into Evernote to make them searchable. Kinda kluge-y, but it works.
I’ve created seven or eight pages in my sketchbook already, and am looking forward to creating more. They are mostly design doodles, not developed enough to share here, but it’s good to capture those thoughts as they fly by. I may revisit some of them in my quest for new designs.
Speaking of cute cats, here’s an adorable one, playing “King of the Luggage”. (He is not looking at the camera because he is alertly watching for the Other Cat, lest she try to unseat him.)
I like the placemat and napkin idea!
I used to keep a similar sketchbook, mostly pencil designs, for my machine quilting. 🙂
Impressive – non weavers don’t think about all that planning that make the item efficient, correctly constructed and pretty
Love Fritz’s expression – the classic feline “I’m about to do something wicked.” And the table mat design looks great.
Like the placemat idea, have you thought about simplifying the design and use only the yin/yang cats in the center and removing the cats in the corners. Just my humble opinion but the corner cats do not add anything to the over all design.
Hi Martha,
I did try it with just the yin-yang cats, but I felt it left a big “dead” space on either side of the yin-yangs. The cats break up the space a bit and direct attention back to the yin-yang cats, so I’ve left them in. Thanks for the suggestion, though! It’s always good for me to explore different design ideas.