What I wove with the silk I dyed

I don't think I ever got round to showing you this scarf. I wove it with the results of my dyeing course that I went on in the summer.

It is a silk noil warp and weft. The warp was placed in a gutter and dabbed with different colours, which were very dark when I applied them but finished up very pale, which surprised me. The weft is all green.

I wove it in a twill chequerboard pattern on eight shafts which alternately shows either predominantly warp or weft threads. It is sett at 36 ends per inch and the weft is packed down the same amount. It was pretty awful to weave towards the end because the threads were all so close together and they kept breaking. I felt like I was really hobbling to the finish line, or, say, with only one wheel left on my wagon.

When it came off the loom the fabric was very rigid and inflexible but when it had been washed and ironed it became quite supple and has a linen-like feel to it which I like.

Next time I shall make the sett quite a bit looser. I have wound the warp and the weft skeins and they are ready to be prepared for dyeing and then dyed. I think I need to do some more one gram colour sampling first though as I am not sure about how the colours of the dyes I have will turn out. One day I plan to buy a kilo of good spun silk, but that will be when I am a bit more practised at dyeing. I notice Gaddams has undergone some sort of change of businesss arrangements, and it is from them I would buy my silk so I hope they will wait for me!