Crackle Jacket Continued

A while back Iwas talking about the Spring 2007 crackle exchange (Crackle: the Incidental Threads) and this brings me back to the first rumblings of designing the crackle jacket. The yardage idea I had talked about (Crackle Jacket: First Rumblings) had faded from my conscious mind. But late in the spring I realized that I had only one month to weave samples for the spring crackle exchange. I had just begun weaving some baby blankets, and I am not a fast weaver, so I was pushed for time. In fact, I thought seriously about not weaving samples for this exchange. In any case, I knew it couldn't be fine silk sett at 60 epi. I had to use a heavier yarn for faster warping and weaving. And I certainly didn't have time to dye anything.

Inspired by Leigh's use of her stash to weave some really lovely Summer and Winter stuff, I decided to look at my 20/2 pearl cotton stash. I have never much cared for weaving with this fiber, though at one time I had thought it might be a good way at exploring colors in crackle using a less expensive yarn. I never did anything with that idea because I dye my own yarns. Dyeing silk greatly reduces cost, though that is not my reason for dyeing them. And the dyeing, which includes lots of sampling, the planning and the weaving all take so much time that the cost of silk really becomes negligible. So all my crackle sampling and weaving has been pretty much with silk yarns.

When I checked my stash I discovered that I had some of the colors I had originally planned on using. They were not identical to the original color scheme, but close enough. So I threw together an 8-shaft crackle draft using different using different size blocks in an asymmetrical design and with no threading repeats. I had wanted to explore this kind of threading for awhile. And I decided to use 3 colors in the warp. I wanted, however, to have the colors change, not according to block changes, but according to a mathematical sequence based on Fibonacci.

Here is a part of the drawdown, in black and white (black warp, white weft). The drawdown does show the complete treadling sequence but only a small part of the threading.




For treadling, I decided to try a kind of improvised version of an advancing twill treadling. No tabbies. A one-shuttle weave. Aha, very fast to weave. Well, yes, I did weave with more than one color, so it was really a two shuttle weave. But this is still faster than a 3-shuttle weave. Once the warp was on the loom, I played around with this idea until I got what I kind of liked, both in terms of treadling sequence and in terms of weft colors. And here is a picture of part of the weaving:


The warp colors are blue, gold, and a very grayed brown. The weft uses these same colors with the addition of a pinkish violet.

And here is a closer view of one of the samples:


I rather like the pink-violet as a kind of a punch. But it stands out a bit too much, especially in the closeup. So, if I do use it in the final piece, I shall have to do some careful thinking.

When I finished the crackle exchange samples, I still had warp on the loom for some explorations. But that story is for a another day. The day may not be too far away as it is now off the loom and has been washed and is drying and awaiting a hard press.