Yarn suppliers

I have been looking at the list of Yarn suppliers Leslie gave us, and I came across 'Handweavers studio and Gallery' this named sounded very familiar....turns out last year i went there while i was experimenting with a knit machine. The store is full of very interesting threads and yarns, such as glow in the dark threads, metallics, and loosely spun and even un-spun wools.
Weirdly I tried to googled 3M united the company and all this mumbo-jumbo came up about '3M United Kingdom and Ireland innovations and technology........clearly not the right one.....surley calling them !
George Weil....what a good one!
On their website they sell a magnitude of stuff relating to crafts'- like screens, dyes, weaving, knitting ect.!!

A plie of rubish- destined for the bin

While in the weave room I saw a pile of threads lying on the floor just about to be thrown into the bin. This pile of "rubbish" reminded me of anenmoies and its entangled 'tenticles'.

SS-2012

Spring Summer 2012 trends in fashion
My aim for this project is to put my weave in a fashion context. So, to see the current trends I had a nosey around on Style.com. Much to my surprise one of the major trend this season is 'Oceans 12'. There has been a number of designers working with the ideas of coral, sea creatures, anemones ect. These designers, such as Alexander McQueen, Versace, Balmain and many more have been experimenting with rich colours, textures and elements of 3D design. 
My personal favourite was Versace, possibly favoured over the others because of the story behind the collection- 'a surfer falling in love with a mermaid' what a fantastic thought ! 
The image below is one of the campaign pictures, i loved the use of vibrant blues and water, almost as if a mermaid was emerging from the ocean. The colour scheme reminded me of an image from the aquarium of an almost elegant piece of coral. So, i took inspiration from the two images and created a series of samples from them.

TENSION DRAMA

Can you see the tension ?

Recently I discovered tension is a major issue when using these looms, because there is two different beams with two different qualities of yarns-thread on them they have different tensions. I came across this issue when i was trying out all the different weave structures (to see what they looked and reacted with different thicknesses of yarn) because they started to get a wave in them, it got to a point where the idea of  cutting it off and tying the warp back on (thank god) i managed to fiddle around with it and get the tension right!!

This image above was taken when the tension was off and the sample began to develop a wave !

Cotton Vs.Wool

COTTON VS.WOOL 
This time around i have been put on one of the electric looms,which is intimidating but exciting. Because of this I can now experiment with a technique called 'seer sucker'. To be able to do this you must have two different types of yarns-threads on two different beams, as to allow you to change the tension.
Originally I had planned to use just wool, but discovering they treads had to be different 'types' i added in some cotton to the plan. 

The image above is a picture of the thread wrap where i incorporated cotton into the all wool plan. I had to add sections in the middle of the wool so it would pucker. (The colours stayed the same, but they were in cotton rather than wool).

Project 2: Aquariums

Personal Brief
The theme I have decided to undertake for project two is about Aquariums (coral, anemones, aquatic creatures. ect). The idea for this project came from the previous task of ordered opposites, mine were trapped and free. Whilst at the zoo taking pictures for this I went into the aquarium section, where I was amazed at the beautiful colours textures and shapes contained in these environments.
I plan on going to another aquarium and a pet store, the library, and a few exhibitions; where i will collect visual images, information, and drawings. Then incorporating it all into the workshop weave. Through experimentation with textured colourful materials (yarns-threads) and weave structures, I will also be experimenting with a technique called seer suckering.
Having done weave before I am more aware of the techniques and materials to experiment with, also the ways about starting. This time around I will be working directly from all my own images, and incorporating my ideas into a fashion context.

P.E Blogging Task

Evaluating my project 

For this project my workshop was 

weave, never having done weave before I was not sure what to expect. In the beginning weave was very tedious and time consuming, but once I actually started weaving it was very enjoyable. There are many different patterns and effects you can create. For exampled the sample on the right, I wove elastic into the weave so when it was taken off of the loom the sample would crinkle up. The inspiration from this sample came from the colours and textures of a pomegranate and its compact seeds inside. The is another pattern called sateen where you block most of the weft of the weave and the thread woven through if predominate, so I could really portray the colours properly. 

My original thoughts for samples included a lot of print on top of them, how after speaking with Lesley (the tutor) I began experimenting with threads, like metals, papers elastic and combining threads together. The image to the right is a sample where thin copper wire and paper threads were woven into the sample. So once it was taken off the loom I could bend it into 3D shapes. The inspiration for this sample came from the first page in my sketchbook, where a 3D folded paper structure is, you can open and close it to reveal colours within the white folds. 

During this project I focused alot on having a variety of visual research because last time this was something lacking greatly through the entire project. Doing this allowed me to create a variety of different samples; varying in colour, texture, weight, size and materials. Where as last time there was deffinantly a common theme throughout all of the work. 

Something else that greatly improved during this project was the usage of my sketchbook, usually I would do the work and stick in later. However this time around the sketchbook work happened at the same time as the weave, or even before. This worked out really well because I could constantly get inspiration from the colours and images in the book. Although there is not as much drawing in this sketchbook as there was in the last one. It was difficult finding inspiration to draw from, because I was not going to sit and draw a loom or my weave for that matter ! Its been more straining, so I've had to look at different objects and ideas which 'trapping' is part of. In the long run that has been good thing, seeing ads it is just adding to the visual research. One of the obejcts' I focused on was a group of chilies, an image of them is up on the right. They have fantastic colours, shapes and have the idea of trapped (seeds on the inside). 

This project of sampling has shown me that I really enjoy working with colour, proportions and also weave. I am doing weave again for the next workshop, I cant wait to use a double thread loom and learn new patterns. With a double thread loom you can do many more patterns and techniques, you cant with the looms we were using this time. Ive started thinking about what type of subject to choose, and I'm thinking a really bright, textured and layered topic !

This sample below got me thinking of the project to come, this one is pretty bright, layered and textured. Weave was the work shop i enjoyed the most and cant wait to start it again !!