Saturday, December 28, 2013

Pinwheels

Pinwheels or Houndstooth?

Prior to weaving I knew the two tone, black and white fabric as houndstooth.  When I started looking at weaving drafts I learned that it is generally called pinwheels in the weaving community.  

What is the difference?  The traditional houndstooth was woven using a 4 shaft loom. It is 4 threads white alternated with 4 threads black in both the warp and weft.

When you introduce more shafts to create the design it offers many more possibilities for changing the design.

Using an 8 shaft draft the traditional houndstooth starts to look more like a pinwheel.  It is now warped using 8 white then 8 black threads. The threading is a straight draw or 12345678.  The weft is also alternated 8 black, 8 white.   What is nice about this threading is that there are many ways to change the tie-up and treadling to create a different design using the same warp.

With a change to the threading fancy pinwheels are created.  Here are a few examples.  Just click on the picture to increase the size.





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