Sample #24 of my 4-shaft crackle manners of weaving sampler.
The term "pictorial" crackle comes from Lucy Brusic's A Crackle Weave Companion (pages 52 to 62). While not terribly detailed, crackle is
capable of weaving recognizable albeit stylized shapes. Brusic lists a number of them:
- flower patterns
- church (ecclesiastical) motifs
- cottage windows
- pine trees and snowflakes
Most of these I've already woven in various projects, and I'll put photos of them at the end of this post. The one I'm particularly
interested in for this sampler is the pine trees. Pine trees and snowballs
were a favorite when I wove them on eight shafts in Summer & Winter:
According to Harriet Tidball, crackle is the only structure that can weave
pine trees on four shafts. In looking through my books, I found three designs
for pine tree motifs in crackle.
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Mary Snyder, The Crackle Weave page 23, adapted from Mary Meigs Atwater's The Recipe Book. |
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| Mary Meigs Atwater's The Recipe Book, Series I, "Coverlets," Recipe No. 12. |
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| Several designs from Harriet Tidball's The Weaver's Book page 131 |
Because my loom is already threaded in a particular pattern I can't weave any of the above for the sampler. Nor can I try the snowflakes. But considering that loom woven pine trees are highly stylized anyway, I decided to see what I could do.
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| A pine tree of sorts. Can you see it? |
Okay, not one I'd do on this threading again, but I liked giving the possibility a try and I'm curious as to how wet finishing will tidy it up. I think tree motifs have a lot of possibilities: small towels, table runners, place mats, napkins, scarves, gift bags, etc. Maybe add some beads and embroidery to make Christmas and fruit trees.
As promised, here are my other pictorial crackle motifs from previous projects:
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Church weaving as another table runner. |
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| Cottage Windows table runner |
2 comments:
The Summer/Winter Pine Tree motives are fantastic!
The more I learn through what you write, the more appreciation I have for weaving, something heretofore I paid very little attention to.
The pine trees are my favorite motif so far. I'm going to try a table runner in crackle with pine trees, to explore the possibilities. I'm not convinced they'll top the S&W trees, but it will be interesting to see how they turn out.
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