In 2008, I took a warp painting class with Betsy Blumenthal, of "Hands on Dying" fame. The 8/2 cotton "warp" has been hanging around since. I decided that I wanted to use it for something, so decided to make a scarf warp.
I wasn't sure what to use for weft. One other enterprising student had not only brought her warp for painting, but also weft yarn. I hadn't thought of that, so that wasn't an option. The warp colors were on the purple side - magenta and blue with some yellow/green as well. Using one of the "rules of thumb" I had learned from JoAnn I looked around for what I might have that was a kind of "gray" in a medium shade based on the colors.
I wasn't really looking for gray, but a color that had the hues of the warp paint. If you think of the color wheel as a triangle, with Red, Blue and Yellow at the apexes (or apices, if you prefer), the sides of the triangle are the combinations of the two apexes. For example, on the Yellow / Blue side, there would be varying colors from yellow to green to blue. The center of this color triangle would be composed of various combinations of all three colors - red, blue and yellow. These colors would look like grays, browns and mauves.
I did have some purple 8/2 cotton (the same type of yarn as the warp) that could have worked. I also had some cotton that I had dyes many years ago that looked like a little better shade. It had a smoother texture and was of a slightly smaller grist that the warp.
The weave structure is a point twill on 4-shafts. The points are not regular, (i.e., some are 4 up/4 down and others are 8 up and maybe 4 down). I think this gives it a more interesting look.
The scarf turned out OK. I probably should have spent more time separating the warp threads, but they were fairly sticky and I kind of like the sections of color. The purple weft also worked well, becoming a background to the warp rather than overwhelming it.
All in all, I would say this was successful.
I wasn't sure what to use for weft. One other enterprising student had not only brought her warp for painting, but also weft yarn. I hadn't thought of that, so that wasn't an option. The warp colors were on the purple side - magenta and blue with some yellow/green as well. Using one of the "rules of thumb" I had learned from JoAnn I looked around for what I might have that was a kind of "gray" in a medium shade based on the colors.
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| Scarf in progress. Warp colors are not quite true |
I did have some purple 8/2 cotton (the same type of yarn as the warp) that could have worked. I also had some cotton that I had dyes many years ago that looked like a little better shade. It had a smoother texture and was of a slightly smaller grist that the warp.
The weave structure is a point twill on 4-shafts. The points are not regular, (i.e., some are 4 up/4 down and others are 8 up and maybe 4 down). I think this gives it a more interesting look.
The scarf turned out OK. I probably should have spent more time separating the warp threads, but they were fairly sticky and I kind of like the sections of color. The purple weft also worked well, becoming a background to the warp rather than overwhelming it.
All in all, I would say this was successful.
