Weaving Letters Of The Alphabet

Weaving letters is always a bit of a challenge and has been the subject of many tapestry weaving workshops. However it is more time consuming than it is difficult to do. As long as you follow the lines on the cartoon behind the work and ensure the warp count is high enough to avoid obvious jumps across the warp threads, it is no more difficult than blending or hatching techniques can be. The speech bubble shown below here is part of a portrait weaving I will be exhibiting in the Four Directions show.

Tapestry Weaving from Drawn or Painted Design to the Finished Woven Image.

Above is a cartoon I have documented as it is being woven in the photos below. The original painting has been adjusted in Photoshop to produce a workable cartoon. This process helps to clarify and select clear boundaries within the painting. By simplifying the original painting with Photoshop or a similar program I was able to create an image that still retained the integrity of the original painting, while at the same time creating a weavable cartoon which better suited the technical restraints of the low warp count I was working on. 

Note that in this instance the weaving has well and truly deviated from the exactness of the detail, especialy in the dogs main body area. There are 3 reasons for this. The first is that the warp count was too low (there should have been more vertical threads). The second is because the size of the weaving space is too small (it would need to be a much bigger weaving to allow for the detail to be included). And thirdly, it was a play piece of my own, which enabled me to have the freedom of extreme artistic license. It now belongs to Su anyway, who lives near the dingo isle of Fraser, and who also happens to have been born in the year of the Dog.

                                           1.

                                           2.

                                           3.

THE MAIN BODY AREA OF THE DOG HAS BEEN WOVEN USING HAND-SPUN DOG HAIR. OTHER YARNS USED ARE RAYON, WOOL, COTTON AND SILK.

  

Tapestry weaving WORK IN PROGRESS.

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2.

3.

The two tapestries were woven side by side.  Numbered 1-3 above and below, you can follow the works progression and clearly see the cartoon behind the weaving indicating the design lines which need to be followed. With these smaller pieces I usually avoid marking the actual warp threads as the cartoon is small enough to flip up and down into view to use as an adequate enough guide.

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2.

3.

E.P.I. EXPLAINED

Ends per inch or e.p.i. are used to indicate the number of warps (vertical threads) that the tapestry weaving is woven onto for every inch you measure across the completed work.
For example the rug you can see being woven on the loom here is set at approximately 5 e.p.i. This means that for every inch across the entire horizontal row of the warp threads there are 5 vertical threads. This is referred to as a low warp.

It also means that creating vertical lines in this particular rug design should be avoided as much as possible. The low number of e.p.i. will always dictate the limitations of the end design.