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Monday, September 5, 2011

Saori weaving class with rigid heddle looms

A local knitting shop , The Golden Fleece in Santa Cruz CA., wanted a weaving class with rigid heddle looms. I said sure BUT it will need to have a Saori philosophical flavor, so the owner said fine. First class with the 6 students we warped, covered basic weaving then the students took the looms ho home  for 3 weeks to weave and returned yesterday for the the "finishing" techniques class. 1/2 of the class not only finished there scarves , but they warped on there own and wove another scarf! one student wove 4 scarves! These were all new weavers.
one student loves tartans


another lavenders and beige cotton


 a lovely textured green scarf.
 another student wove purples, amazing and with wonderful drape.



 cashmere and some novelty yarns for this lovely  lapis  shade scarf


 amethyst  and alpaca greys and lavender and a eye lash yarn  too.


 and the tartan student , on her own, reached out to more expressive saori-ness




APPLAUDING these first time weavers.

peaceful weaving
jill
www.saorisantacruz.com

4 comments:

  1. Hi Jill. Susan here. I was there on 29 Feb 2016 for a one on one class with you. I was getting ready to warp my rigid heddle loom and decided to look on PInterest for some more inspiration. I spotted this right away. It's wonderful. You and your blog are wonderful for supplying plenty of inspiration.

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    1. hi susan! Thank you! It was so delightful to meet you last week at the studio and you got to learn si many new Saori techniques in class now go and weave yourself into every piece and yes you can use your rigid heddle loom too!
      Peaceful weaving
      Jill

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  2. I have rigid heddle looms-does it make sense to also buy a Piccolo?
    What can I do differently on it? Thank you. Love your stuff!

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  3. hi mimu
    i am just getting around to answering your great question
    the rigid heddle loom is very differnt than the saori piccolo.
    1 it is faster and a rhythm to weave with treadles and harnesses and a reed verses the rigid heddle loom
    2 less strain on you body with the saori looms . rigid heddle looms only use upper body and docking and undocking and holding the heddel to beat is not the same as using feet and arms to weave
    3 with the saori loom you have a built in bobbin winder and use boat shuttles that unfurl yarn with no drag and very efficently fill bobbins rather than stick shuttles on rigid heddle looms
    4 you can put on longer warps on the saori loom
    5 releasing the cloth beam and warp is ergonomic and no strain on your wrists on the saori loom
    6 saori has premade warps up to 33 yards long thread and weave
    7 you can buy the inside sets and and change out a weaving in progress with out unthreading , and letter come back to it . it takes about 10 minutes to do this!
    8 the saori loom need no satnd or table it is a self contained loom with the bobbin winder and shelf built in
    9 i can see the difference between a a weaving woven on a conventional loom or rigid heddel loom and the saori. it has a free flowing natural set to weave, it allows the weaver to relax and weave like no other loom does. very quiet and comfortable
    10 besides haveing the option of using the saori premade warps, you can also wind you own warp. saori has oprtion equipment that allows you to not only thread your reed and harnesses away from the loom comfortably sitting but you can beam on the table top threading holder and create your own ready made warps .

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I Love to hear from my blog readers
Jill