Plain weaves with quality threads

It's a coincidence that there's been a few significant changes in my life at the start of 2009. Mostly not related to my fibre / weaving interests, so I'll just mention in passing that the start of a new working hours and different work locations last week kept me from writing about the many things I'm thinking about and working on in my 'spare' time.

So, where shall I start? Not with the new loom. I'll just say for those of you who haven't heard yet I have a new (extra) weaving loom and am very pleased with it. More on that another time when I can get my photos uploaded.

I was wondering where to start writing about the different subjects of different books I've been reading, I was thinking that I'd been following several lines of investigation at once, then I looked at the pile of books again and they re-arranged themselves in my mind. I see the connection, it's in my title, plain weaves and interesting, quality yarns.

I'm interested in the history of handweaving and different national traditions.

I have found that broadly speaking these differences in the 20th century handweaving traditions I have been reading about:

- the US tends to favour jack looms, overshot, plain yarns and at times very complex weave patterns,
- from Scandinavia I see countermarch or counterbalance looms, more high tension warps such as linen and the distinctive weaves such as rep,
- in the UK I have found more tradition of balanced plain and twill weaves, wool yarns and tweeds, and then fancy yarns in these weaves (see my earlier post about Bernat Klein).

Taking the UK, I read some time ago Theo Moorman's autobiography Weaving as an Art Form, a personal statement, published Van Nostrand Reinhold Company, 1975, and last year I added to my understanding of her life and work with Theo Moorman 1907-1990: her life and work as an artist weaver, edited by Hilary Diaper, published University Gallery Leeds 1992, ISBN 1 874331 01 4 (hardback) and 1 874331 002 2 (softback). Theo Moorman worked largely by creating designs in plain weave cloth with inlaid yarns.

I rediscovered Theo Moorman once more in Fine-Art Weaving, by Irene Waller, published by Batsford, 1979, along with other weavers of the late 20th C. The work of some of the others looks very dated and "70s" to me (I do know this is currently fashionable, but I recall the 1970s). A few stand the test of time very well - such as the amazing Peter Collingwood. In the introduction, the background of early 20th C British weavers is given, and I found a tantalizing, but short biography of Ethel Mairet (1872-1952).

Nigel, a fan of Ethel Mairet, directed me to A Weaver's Life: Ethel Mairet 1872-1952, Margot Coatts, published by the Crafts Council, 1983, ISBN 0 903798 70 0. Here I found links in attitude to cloth design that reminded me of Bernat Klein - simple weave (she used plain weave, he used simple twills) and an interest in yarn. I quote Margot Coatts (p.82)

"Ethel Mairet's approach to weaving was that it should be an intuitive and expressive response to the colour and texture of the yarn",

and Margot herself (p.104) quotes the representative of Greg's yarn spinning mill, who later created yarns for Ethel, saying that he:

..."very soon realised she was not a weaver, not a designer, but a yarn enthusiast - not just for the look of a yarn but also in the feel".

Inspired by weavers she had met in Ceylon (Sri Lanka), Ethel Mairet started her weaving workshop using handspun yarns. Later Greg's of Stockport created characterful yarn for her such as a fine cotton snarl yarn which she coloured with natural dyes.

Now to move into a totally different part of the world, but more handspun yarns used by handweavers on simple looms to create the most beautiful cloth.

Last autumn I very much enjoyed seeing Kente cloth in the permanent exhibition at Bankfield Museum, Halifax. About the same time Syne Mitchell wrote about Kente cloth in Weavezine, Fall 2008, she referenced "African Textiles" by John Picton and John Mack. I now have two, different editions of this book. =Sigh=

I borrowed from the local library (by request, for 80p) the second edition, which I highly recommend:
African Textiles, John Picton and John Mack, published 1989 by The Trustees of the British Museum, ISBN 0-7141-1595-9. Discovering it to be an invaluable reference, I ordered a book I found on www.abebooks.co.uk, only to discover that I had ordered the first edition, published in 1979. The second edition has much more material, both writing and photos. So, I found a second edition and ordered that too. It's getting late and if I start telling you how much I like this book I'll be still tapping the keys into early tommorrow a.m., best leave that for now. However, there goes my book buying budget for up to March. Yep, this year I have set myself a budget with monthly amounts and aim to spend less on books -
this is to compensate for buying The New Loom - I'll tell you about that someday soon, with photos!!

Thrown silk - and the Macclesfield Silk Industry

I've been lent a most readable history book, East Cheshire Textile Mills, published in 1993 by the Royal Commission on The Historic Monuments of England, now, sadly, out of print.

I live in the west of Derbyshire, close to the Cheshire border, and one of the mills featured is a watermill only 20 minutes walk from our house. This book brings together places and buildings I know with the story of the local textile industry, hence there is much to interest me.


WATER POWERED TEXTILE MILLS
The textile mills of east Cheshire came about because of water power - the streams and rivers running down from the pennine hills made mill machinery possible, and the first mills were built in the 1700s. The silk industry in this area pre-dates the cotton industry.

Silk throwing pre-dates the mills and was carried out in this area in the 1600s to meet a growing demand for luxury and fancy goods. However, the throwing techniques used were not capable of producing organzine for warp threads and until Italian methods of throwing (using water-powered machinery) were introduced in the early 18th century, only the lower quality tram thread (used for weft) was produced and organzine had to be imported from Italy.

The first mill producing organzine was built in Derby (in Derbyshire, not Cheshire) in 1704, on the banks of the river Derwent . It is thought that this was the first powered mill in England.

It was 1744 when Charles Roe, a button merchant, put up the first silk throwing mill in Macclesfield.


THROWN SILK PRODUCTION
So how was the tram thread produced before mechanisation? There's an amazing account taken from an 1841 Parliamentary enquiry:

"... He (the boy) takes first a rod containing four bobbins of silk from the twister who stands at his 'gate' or wheel, and having fastened the ends, runs to the 'cross' at the extreme end of the room, round which he passess the threads of each bobbin and returns to the 'gate'. He is dispatched on a second expedition of the same kind.... "

The twister's wheel was turned to twist the threads, and the threads then wound onto a bobbin. The room the boy ran up and down was between 25 and 35 yards (23 - 32 metres).

When I read this description, it fixed in my mind a clear understanding of what thrown silk actually is, and how / why it is different to a spun yarn.


THE SPINNING OF SILK THREAD
The process of producing thrown silk - reeling and winding silk from the cocoon, cleaning and throwing - was inefficient and the waste silk from the process was estimated in 1765 to be around half of all the silk. As silk was so valuable, and as the industry increased, there was a great need to find ways of using this silk.

Here there is a link to the cotton industry (for which nearby Manchester and Lancashire are famous).

Machinery created for cotton spinning was adapted for silk. To begin with, the silk was cut into short staples, 25-50 mm in length, which could be spun on cotton spinning machinery.


A HIGHER QUALITY SPUN THREAD
Then Gibson and Campbell of Glasgow obtained a patent in 1836 for a machine for the spinning of long staple length silk, up to 250mm length. This enabled production of high quality yarn from the better quality silk filament waste. Silk spinning became established in Cheshire, in mills at Macclesfield and Congleton, by the early 19th century.


MACCLESFIELD
Macclesfield, Cheshire had not only mills for production of silk thread, but also was a centre for weaving. During the 18th century there was a thriving handloom industry, with weavers either working independently or as outworkers. For example, in 1818, one silk manufacturer, Henry Critchley, employed 140-160 weavers. 50 worked at his factory premises and the rest were outworkers, weaving in garrets. Garret houses were specially built with the top (third) storey having large windows to make good workshops, and two dwelling floors below. Some of the houses were built in terraces with one long garret above several dwellings. It is easy to spot many of these distinctive houses today.


TO LEARN MORE..
If you have an opportunity to get there, you will find some excellent museums in Macclesfield.

The publications in the late Ralph Griswold's Online Digital Archive include Silk by H. Gaddum of Macclesfield and Luther Hooper's book, Silk: Its Production and Manufacture which I mentioned in my previous post. Use this link for the publications on silk.