today was a colorful day! it started with the dyeing of my kasuri skeins, which went well; that is, after i corrected the first batch of dye which i had made a mathematical error in, by having to discard it down the drain. eh, check math twice, measure dyestuff once.
after lunch we took a visit to the kawashima selkon factory and museum. very neat! they have a ginormous 24 meters wide hand loom which they create large tapestries on, such as special stage curtains, and large scale wall tapestries. there are smaller hand looms which are used for weaving obi, both ooak commissions and regular orders on the second floor. most of the obi can take anywhere from one to six months to complete. i love the little shuttles they use, i would think they would definitely be useful for inlay weaving.
i actually had an opportunity to try my hand at weaving an obi earlier last week (see hand in upper right corner of below photo? mine). so hard! you work from the backside of the piece, so you don't see it until you take it off the loom, as well as the loom takes a lot of muscle to operate. i was so nervous!
after dinner, one of my classmates had a box of natural dye samples she completed at a retreat last weekend. they were so lovely, both silk kinu and wool uuru.
tomorrow is the start of my warping the kasuri. i'm scared, but excited, i don't want to mess up the placement of the warp kasuri areas.
Woooow, what I wouldn't give to see that ginormous loom in action.
ReplyDeletewell, there were several operators working on the day we went; the thing is, is that it's a hand loom, and it looked like each person had an area of their own to complete and i think they were using it similar to tapestry weaving.
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