Rainbow Triangles

I came up with this variation on an Egyptian band for an SCA event recently and, since it's Pride Month, I thought I'd share it with you too. Two pieces of the inspiration band are held by the Victoria and Albert Museum in London and it's one of the objects I've been lucky enough to see in person during one of my behind-the-scenes museum trips. You can read more about it and find a draft for weaving the original in Silvia Aisling's book Tablet-Woven Bands from Egypt (buy it via a source in Germany to get it in colour!).

The yarn I used for this band is King Cole Merino-Blend 4-ply in the colours black, blackcurrant, sapphire, grass, mustard, cinnamon and red, with black as the weft.

Link to the text version of this draft

Link to the TDD file for this draft

As with all of the free drafts/patterns on this site, you are welcome to weave them, sell bands woven using them, and use them to teach other weavers, just as long as you state where you found them.

Book News

I'm happy to announce that, all going well, there will be a second book this year! I've been working away on one of the sample bands and am now one third of the way through the stack of designs. There's 153 in total (at the moment), so it's going to take a while yet, but I wanted to share a little about the project with you. 

It's something of a return to the style of my early books, Warp-Twined Angles and Vacant-Hole Pinwheels, in that there will be a whole host of drafts woven using the same threading that you will be able to weave in any order you like, only this time the drafts vary in length. The shortest has a pattern repeat of just 4 rows, while the longest will take 80 rows to complete. I'm weaving them in size order, so I expect the number of drafts I complete each day to slow down as I reach the end.

In addition to all the new drafts, there will be an analysis of the historical band I used as a starting point for the book, as well as instructions for producing your own reconstruction.

I'm excited to see what you weave from it and where the designing tips I'm including will take you!

Flash

It's ages since I posted a new free draft on the blog, so I thought I'd share this one with you. It's a simple threaded-in pattern (the design is determined by the placement of the colours in the tablets rather than a special turning sequence) and all the tablets are turned continuously forwards, so there will be a build-up of twist that you can undo by switching to turning all the tablets backwards. I've been struggling with names for drafts lately, so I threw it open to Instagram (I'm @tabletweaving over there, by the way) and the wonderful Mari came up with "Flash", which I think fits really well.

Link to TDD file for Flash

The text version of this draft is as follows:

Threading:

 * S threaded tablet (↻)

    A: Yellow (#ffff00)

    B: Yellow (#ffff00)

    C: Yellow (#ffff00)

    D: Yellow (#ffff00)

 * Z threaded tablet (↻)

    A: Red (#ff0000)

    B: Red (#ff0000)

    C: Red (#ff0000)

    D: Red (#ff0000)

 * S threaded tablet (↻)

    A: Yellow (#ffff00)

    B: Red (#ff0000)

    C: Red (#ff0000)

    D: Red (#ff0000)

 * S threaded tablet (↻)

    A: Yellow (#ffff00)

    B: Yellow (#ffff00)

    C: Red (#ff0000)

    D: Yellow (#ffff00)

 * S threaded tablet (↻)

    A: Yellow (#ffff00)

    B: Red (#ff0000)

    C: Red (#ff0000)

    D: Red (#ff0000)

 * Z threaded tablet (↻)

    A: Red (#ff0000)

    B: Red (#ff0000)

    C: Red (#ff0000)

    D: Red (#ff0000)

 * S threaded tablet (↻)

    A: Yellow (#ffff00)

    B: Yellow (#ffff00)

    C: Yellow (#ffff00)

    D: Yellow (#ffff00)

 * Z threaded tablet (↻)

    A: Yellow (#ffff00)

    B: Yellow (#ffff00)

    C: Red (#ff0000)

    D: Yellow (#ffff00)

 * Z threaded tablet (↻)

    A: Yellow (#ffff00)

    B: Red (#ff0000)

    C: Red (#ff0000)

    D: Red (#ff0000)

 * Z threaded tablet (↻)

    A: Yellow (#ffff00)

    B: Yellow (#ffff00)

    C: Red (#ff0000)

    D: Yellow (#ffff00)

 * S threaded tablet (↻)

    A: Yellow (#ffff00)

    B: Yellow (#ffff00)

    C: Yellow (#ffff00)

    D: Yellow (#ffff00)

 * Z threaded tablet (↻)

    A: Red (#ff0000)

    B: Red (#ff0000)

    C: Red (#ff0000)

    D: Red (#ff0000)

 * S threaded tablet (↻)

    A: Yellow (#ffff00)

    B: Red (#ff0000)

    C: Red (#ff0000)

    D: Red (#ff0000)

 * S threaded tablet (↻)

    A: Yellow (#ffff00)

    B: Yellow (#ffff00)

    C: Red (#ff0000)

    D: Yellow (#ffff00)

 * S threaded tablet (↻)

    A: Yellow (#ffff00)

    B: Red (#ff0000)

    C: Red (#ff0000)

    D: Red (#ff0000)

 * Z threaded tablet (↻)

    A: Red (#ff0000)

    B: Red (#ff0000)

    C: Red (#ff0000)

    D: Red (#ff0000)

 * S threaded tablet (↻)

    A: Yellow (#ffff00)

    B: Yellow (#ffff00)

    C: Yellow (#ffff00)

    D: Yellow (#ffff00)

Turning:

 1. 17F

 2. 17F

 3. 17F

 4. 17F

 5. 17F

 6. 17F

 7. 17F

 8. 17F

As with all of the free drafts/patterns on this site, you are welcome to weave them, sell bands woven using them, and use them to teach other weavers, just as long as you state where you found them.

It's Almost Time!

Not going to lie, I'm pretty excited! My publisher has the files for the new book and are working on the proof copies! I should be ready to release it into the wild in early March, all going well. It's a bit different to my other books as it's mostly tablet weaving theory rather than practice, but there's still a new design in there for you to play with.

ETA: My new book, Tablet Weaving in Theory and Practice: A Tablet Weaver's Record Book, is now live in the Blurb book shop and can be purchased as hardcover, softcover and pdf editions!

Coming Soon to a Bookcase Near You!

If all goes well with proof copies and so on, I should have a new book to share with you for the end of this month! I'm more than a little excited, can you tell? This one has been in the works since early last year and I was hoping to publish in November as I have with previous volumes, but life got in the way several times. With this one almost done, I'm now doing the initial planning and layouts for the next book, so this may well turn out to be a two book year. 

Tablet Weaving Draft Designer Updates

The year's end has rolled around again (or rather it did a month ago) and there have been a few changes to Tablet Weaving Draft Designer. In the Display section we now have a "show only thread colour" option which will fill each square on the grid with the colour of the thread in that square and an "S-Z" toggle which will allow you to flip the letters below the threading diagram. This leaves everything else the same, with only the S and Z labels changing.

Hedge Maze

After weaving my advent band over much of December, I wanted something with a simple, soothing rhythm to it for my project over the Christmas break. I opened up the folder I keep both my published and unpublished designs in and wandered through it until I found something to fit the bill. This one comes from November 2021. I have a bit of a backlog! I was at a loss as to what to name it, so I asked Instagram and this was the name I liked the most, especially as I often hang my bands up in hedges to photograph them!

This design isn't twist-neutral and will cause a build up of twist behind the tablets, so I've included a reversed version that will allow you to weave it out. As ever, you can find links to the text version and TDD file for both drafts at the bottom of the page.

Link to text version of Hedge Maze
Link to TDD file for Hedge Maze
Link to text version of Hedge Maze Reversed
Link to TDD file for Hedge Maze Reversed

As with all of the free drafts/patterns on this site, you are welcome to weave them, sell bands woven using them, and use them to teach other weavers, just as long as you state where you found them.

Tablet Weaving Advent 2023

This year I indulged in a little festive silliness and picked random drafts from my book Warp-Twined Angles and wove them up in festive colours. I used the same threading diagram as the book, but swapped red for the black, white for the grey and green for the white. I also changed up the colours of the selvedge tablets a bit too so that all three colours are represented in them. Instead of the black weft of the original, I used red to match it to the main motif colour in the drafts.

Of the two threading diagrams above, the top one is from Warp-Twined Angles and the lower one is the modified version I'm using for this project. The yarn I'm using is a sock-weight merino/nylon blend by Mothy and the Squid in the colours Ruby, Avocado and Snowdrop.

I released a video each day of advent of me picking a draft, then showing what it looks like woven up in the new colours. There's also a playlist on my YouTube channel that has all my advent videos gathered together. I also released the videos over in my Instagram account, where you can find me as @tabletweaving. You can watch the video for day 1 in the window below.

Countable Infinity

 A few weeks ago, James (my husband and the programmer half of our Tablet Weaving Draft Designer team) was looking wistfully at some of the sample bands in my workroom and asked if I could make him a tunic-style shirt with fancy trim on it. I showed him some of the things from the folder of unwoven designs and we picked one, then I played with it and adjusted it until it matched what he was hoping for.

The 10/2ne Lunatic Fringe tubular spectrum yarns I have were at the tip of his wishlist, particularly the yellow and green shades (#10 yellow, #10 yellow-green and #10 green), paired with their 10/2ne black. It's a combination I've used before and the colours pop really nicely, plus the yarn is a pleasure to weave with. I used a black sewing thread (rather than the same yarn as the warp) as the weft for this band to help me beat the threads into place tighter and get crisper pattern lines. Apart from the selvedge tablets, this band is twist-neutral, but you will find that you get less take-up on the two pattern tablets on each side, so you may have to retension your warp.

Link to text version

Link to TDD file

As with all of the free drafts/patterns on this site, you are welcome to weave them, sell bands woven using them, and use them to teach other weavers, just as long as you state where you found them.

Uisce

It's been a while since I shared a new free draft and I have a backlog to share with you, which I'm hoping to work my way through them over the next few months. The inspiration for this one is just a little different from my usual bands. 

Most days, when I take the dog for her morning walk, I go past several little utility hole covers and I've been fascinated by the keys pattern around the edge of them. When I decided to make myself a Viking apron dress to wear at Drachenwald's 30th Anniversary celebration, I wanted a trim that drew on something distinctly Irish (given that we've been living in Ireland since the end of 2021) and what could be more Irish than Uisce!

I took a photo of the hole cover and roughly sketched it out on a piece of paper, then drew the draft out. I chose blue, black and white, as they're my colours within the SCA and my arms have a blue river running across the middle, rather like the blue waves across the band. It's mostly a diagonals pattern, with a few areas of 3/1 broken twill double-face to produce white areas and blue lines parallel to the selvedge.

If you chose to weave this draft, it would definitely benefit from the use of a row marker of some type. The horizontal ruler in Tablet Weaving Draft Designer is excellent for this. 

Link to the Uisce draft TDD file
Link to the Text version of the Uisce draft

As with all of the free drafts/patterns on this site, you are welcome to weave them, sell bands woven using them, and use them to teach other weavers, just as long as you state where you found them.