
Thursday, March 31, 2011
good ole sackville nb

Monday, March 28, 2011
new scarves and A Handmade Assembly
Friday, March 25, 2011
the path ahead

Monday, March 21, 2011
unexpected dye pot surprise
My technique of over-dyeing my scarves can sometimes lead to some surprising and beautiful results. I over-dye each of my scarves after it is woven to colour only the white raw silk with acid dye (meant for protein fibres), leaving the cotton colours untouched (cellulose fibres). But, every now and then, one of my cotton colours, pre-dyed at the factory, takes on the dye pot colour in a strange and interesting way. My guess is this is because the cone of cotton was exposed to a sizing or starch that made the fibres more vulnerable to acid dye. Whatever makes the cotton more receptive to the acid dye, it often occurs in intervals on the string, resulting in patterns that are very reminiscent of ikat dyeing techniques. Sometimes a new cone of a particular colour of cotton is completely receptive to the acid dye, resulting in an overall shading of the weft cotton.
For the scarf you see here, I used a peachy coloured cotton for the weft, some of it from a new cone, and some of it from an older cone - all the same colour before the scarf met the dye pot. Once dyed, a really interesting zig zag pattern appeared, as well as whole block of weft that turned an almost solid dark grey.
Friday, March 18, 2011
shifting shores
Wednesday, March 16, 2011
juggling on the cusp of change
Wednesday, March 9, 2011
exponential growth x3
I've kept going with the exploration of exponential growth using crochet. I was supposed to have a crit last week in my sculpture class at NSCAD, but three of us got pushed to this week because we ran out of time. And this gave me more time to keep playing with string, a crochet hook, crochet stitches, and mathematical growth scenarios.
The black one was made using a thick 3-ply wool, crocheted using single stitch, with exponential growth applied so that each row doubles the number of stitches that were in the previous row (2:1 ratio). The gray one was made using a 1-ply wool, crocheted using double stitch (slowing down the rate of growth), with the same rate of exponential growth as the black one. The red one is made using two colours of one ply wool, spiraling around each other. The dark red wool crocheted using a double stitch growing at a 2:1 ratio, while the bright red wool was used to slow down the exponential growth of dark red using a single stitch at a ratio of 1:1 after each row of dark red stitched. Really interesting how the ruffles end of making new circles in the red piece, emphasized by the two tones.
Monday, March 7, 2011
state of the studio
Some of the work waiting to be done in my studio:
First sample for a square scarf....
Sable Island waiting to be embroidered, warp for square scarf production waiting to be put on the loom, and lots of white cotton waiting to be warped and dyed...
Piled crochet islands, more embroidery to be done in the disappearing shorelines piece, and scarves to be woven for a big order going to the Craft Council of NL in April.
New to me stash, delivered by my friend Jenny yesterday as she was attempting to downsize her yarn collection. So much potential.
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