Showing posts with label t-shirt yarn. Show all posts
Showing posts with label t-shirt yarn. Show all posts

Saturday, October 12, 2024

Of T-shirt Yarns & Twill: Wet Finishing the Sampler

Wet finishing was the test. It's a process of soaking and washing newly woven fabric, which serves to relax, settle, soften, full, and shrink the yarns according to fiber content and weave structure. My first two t-shirt yarn fabrics (wanna-be bathroom rug and wanna-be upholstery fabric) did not turn out as hoped after wet finishing. What I learned led to this last sampler. 

Fresh off the loom, unwashed, 5.75" by 24.25"

Wet finishing consisted of machine washing in tepid water and hot machine drying. Ordinarily, I line dry everything, but the dryer serves to help test the fabric to its limits.

After machine washing only. 5" by 21.25"

Most notable is the plain weave section on the right. It did not shrink as much as the remaining twill samples, with a width of 5.75 inches. This is characteristic of combining plain weave with twill.

After machine washing and drying. 4.75" by 20.375" (twills)

I was much happier with how these held up than with the crackle samples. The plain weave sample was, well, plain. But the twill samples were interesting because of the patterns the warp yarn made. 

From the left: twill & reverse, balanced 2/2 twill, and plain weave

From the left: crepe weave, vertical skip twill, and vertical herringbone

The longer warp float in the twill & reverse sample (left) wasn't as much of a problem as it was in the previous samples. Even though I like the zig zags, I think this twill is better suited for finer yarns. The vertical herringbone (yellow sample) resolved that with crisp neat lines. 

Overall, I liked the density and thickness of the fabric. I think it would work well for a throw rug.

I'm happy to have come up with a good structure for this yarn! I'm happy with what I learned and have to thank the problems for that. I learn so much better through experience that by just reading a book. 

So, a t-shirt bathroom rag rug is still on the planning board. I'll just need to collect more t-shirts first. 

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Thursday, October 10, 2024

Of T-shirt Yarns & Twill: Weaving a New Sampler

I still have a bit of t-shirt yarn left, and wanted to test my observations while they are still fresh in my mind. True experiential knowledge is gained through trial-and-error, which makes experiments very useful. I want to see how the t-shirt yarn behaves with a different weave structure. 

My sample is 6-inches wide in the reed, set at 12 ends per inch with the same rug warp as the cushion fabric. Threading is straight twill.

I deliberately stuck with balanced 2/2 twills (over 2, under 2) with this weft yarn, because the 3-thread floats in my crackle samples were unsatisfactory. A 1/3 or 3/1 twill would likely be just as unsatisfactory. 

My first sample is plain weave.


Then I played around with some twill treadlings.

balanced twill

twill & reverse

vertical herringbone

vertical skip twill

crepe weave

Observations


  • I discovered that quite a few of the twill treadlings gave me a warp float of three wefts, such as the twill & reverse above.
  • These aren't a problem with finer yarns, but I didn't care for them with this bulky yarn.
  • The vertical herringbone corrects this "problem" by skipping one of the treadles in the treadling order.
  • This limits my choices for weaving with t-shirt yarn.
  • I like the pebbly texture the yarn creates. 

The real test will come in the wet finishing! Both of my crackle experiments looked good on the loom, but weren't satisfactory after washing them. We'll see what happens with these.


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Monday, October 07, 2024

Weaving Stool Cushion: Fabric Analysis


The fabric is off the loom, washed, and dried. The finished size is on target, and I love the thickness of the fabric. But I think it is still too loose for the intended purpose, even with the tighter set. 

I think the problem is the rag pattern weft. Even though the recipe listed rags as one of the optional pattern wefts, my T-shirt yarn is chubby. Crackle floats skip only three threads, but with two of those threads being t-shirt yarn, the float is quite long and creates a gappy appearance in the warp yarn.


My conclusion is that t-shirt yarn is better suited to plain weave, or perhaps 2-end weft floats, such as in a twill. I'll have to experiment with that. 

All in all, it's been an interesting experience. Between this and the failed bathroom rug, I've gotten some important information about weaving with t-shirt yarn. I'm taking it to heart, because I love the idea of t-shirt yarn; what a great way to re-use and re-purpose an often discarded item. More sampling to test my ideas is coming soon.

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Friday, October 04, 2024

Weaving Stool Cushion: Weaving (& Thinking Ahead)

Weaving is progressing well. 

The fabric is under tension on the loom so it's hard to tell for sure, but I think my changes are going to work well:

  • tighter sett (12 instead of 10 e.p.i.)
  • different tabby weft (8/4 "rug warp" instead of 4-ply crochet cotton)
The 8/4 isn't what I originally planned to use. But crackle is traditionally used for upholstery fabric, and I reckoned the sturdiest yarns for a stool cushion would wear better. 

I discovered that I made a threading error, so that the pattern isn't turning out like the original recipe. I switched two of the blocks. For the fabric's purpose, it really doesn't matter. The colors aren't terribly interesting, but I they are serviceable for the purpose. 

As I weave, I can't help but think of the bathroom rag rug. I still want to weave one and I'm wondering if I should try this particular recipe once more. I'm filled with numerous "what if I tried . . . " as I weave, and part of me wants to conquer it. On the other, I wouldn't mind trying something new.

At any rate, the fabric will be off the loom soon, and then I'll have to learn how to make a permanent  cushion for my weaving stool.


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Wednesday, September 18, 2024

MMA Series II, No. 4 (AKA Bathroom Rag Rug) Take 2

The title is referring to Mary Meigs Atwater's Recipe Book, from which I adapted the draft for my bathroom rag rug. The rug didn't turn out like I hoped (those problems here ➞ Bathroom Rag Rug: Takeaways), but I think I figured some things out and want a small project to explore them on. 

I got an idea for that project when I plopped the failed rug onto my table loom stool, it occurred to me that I have been wanting a cushion for this stool.

A tie-on chair cushion doesn't fit and doesn't stay. Then I recalled a textiles merit badge over at permies.com for adding a permanent upholstery cushion to a chair or stool. That would be an excellent project for testing out my takeaways for this weaving pattern with my t-shirt yarn. I'd learn something about upholstering too.

Of the t-shirt yarn, I still have plenty in brown, so there's my pattern weft. To coordinate with my studio colors, I'll use neutral for the warp, and gray for the tabby weft.

I'll do my warp calculations for a different sett. The rug warp was set at 10 ends per inch, but I thought a denser fabric would work better for the purpose. This time, I'm going to try 12 EPI.

So, that's the plan.


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Wednesday, September 11, 2024

Bathroom Rag Rug: Takeaways

From a utilitarian perspective, my bathroom t-shirt rag rug was a fail. From an information gathering perspective, I'd call it very useful. 

(how it looked before the washing wonkiness)

I think this would have made a good little rug, had it not been for the differential shrinkage of my different colors of t-shirt yarn. Likely, I can find a use for it, but my takeaways need to focus on what I can learn from it.

The structure is crackle, which I've been exploring this year. I like the potential I see in this particular pattern, and am thinking it may be a candidate for dining room curtain fabric. In the meantime, I have t-shirt yarn leftover, and would like to see if I can tweak things a bit and explore some of the questions in my mind. I'm considering what to do next, but for now, it won't be another rug. 

What I liked:
  • I did like the way the wide bands of color worked out. Not what I would have planned, but I liked it. The colors were chosen from our bathroom stained glass window, so I'm happy with them
  • Adding my extra warp ends to the selvedge blocks worked well. These often look narrower due to draw-in, but they appear to be the same width as the rest of the pattern blocks.

Things I'd like to explore further:
  • Motif shape and color
    • Shape. I'd like the motif to be squared up. Even though I decreased the number of weft shots the recipe called for, the motif is still elongated. I could either decrease the weft shots further, but I'd like to try a finer tabby yarn. 
    • Color. Maybe try warping each motif in its own color or warping each block in a different color. Repeat with the pattern weft. With crackle, a different color tabby can add more color interest too.
  • Fabric density. This was satisfactory after shrinkage (except for the orange t-shirt weft), but I'd like to see what a tighter sett would do.
So, my takeaways are exploratory, and I think I have a project for that. As far as a new bathroom rug, that will have to wait for a different inspiration to strike.

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Tuesday, September 10, 2024

Bathroom Rag Rug: What Happened After I Washed It


Differential shrinkage at its worst! LOL! I machine washed it in warm water and used medium heat in the dryer. 

What happened? The orange t-shirts were obviously not the same fiber content, I'm guessing a cotton/poly blend while the others are cotton. I thought the rest of it tightened up nicely. Maybe I'll cut it up to make pot holders. 😂

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