My first attempt at fabric to cut and sew into a garment.

Warp: 7m x 1372 ends = 9,604metres used

Doubled the sett for the last 1/4 inch each end

Floating selvedges

January 9: the mammoth warp (well it’s mammoth to me) is wound on, 1372 heddles are threaded and the Reed is sleyed - now I’ve got to see if can actually weave this fine.

I can get a clear shed but the yarn does tend to be a bit sticky and the threads are wanting to grab on to each other :(

Jan 10: wove the header
Jan 11: first 20cm (8”) done. It’s slow but not agonisingly so. The reed is leaving marks in the fabric making the self striping look random, I quite like the look of it so if they don’t disappear once it’s washed, dyed and fulled it won’t be a biggie. Planning to dye the finished fabric a dark aubergine ( I think)
Jan 20: reached 1.5m and have managed to break a warp thread - my own fault because I caught it on my watch band for the second time, first time I got away with it and did think that I should probably take it off before I did any damage, should have listened to that inner voice. Fudging my way through a repair …
Jan 28: 6 metres are woven and off the loom! 6 metres and 2cm actually - I think I may have gone crazy! I can’t believe I actually stuck it out all the way through, there were times I thought I’d just stop and hopefully have enough for a skirt or maybe a waistcoat.

Tomorrow I’ll secure the ends and then cut off a piece to wash and dye, let’s hope I get something usable after all this …

Jan 29: sample dyed, approx 10% shrinkage despite all the mistreatment in the dye pot - less than I expected, so far, so good. It’s such a tiny sample compared to the entire piece though do I’m not going to get too excited at this stage.