London: fibres, fabrics and...

fancy dress (NO! But how to allitterate? F...f... fanatics? no, that's even worse... ah: 'ficionados, that will do it!)
So: London: fibres, fabrics and 'ficionados.

Fibres: for the first time, I visited Handweaver's studio, a place full of fibres

"ordinary" yarns, more unusual yarns

glitter yarns

There are also spinning tools, looms, books, magazines... However, having baggage restrictions, I didn't buy much.

Fabrics: there is a small stretch of road having more fabric shops than anywhere else I have ever seen, on Goldhawk road (between Shepherd's bush market and the common). Silks, silks, silks, worsteds, fancy fabrics, fashion fabrics... Did I mention silks? (To make it even better, there is also a pub called The stinging nettle - not quite fibres, but almost...)

As this whole block is threatened with demolition, here are many pictures:

(Should you happen to pass by in the near future, please go in and sign the petition!!!)

'ficionados: as my specific reason for going to London was the Congregation of the Burgon Society, here are a couple of pictures:

A Thursday in Borås

VÄV2011 was held in Borås the weekend past.

As usual there were lots of people, lots of yarns (but why so many knitting yarns?), lots of books... and lots of exhibitions.
As usual I wondered why I had gone, when I was inside in the heat, throng, ready-warped rug warps... (I seldom find anything at these fairs, 'cos I can't concentrate and I don't like to have to use my elbows to "get to see".)
I did meet with many old friends, some of which I haven't seen for years. This meant I had lots of coffee!

But: in Borås, there are several other things to be found. My big finds where about 75 meters of thin worsted fabric and 10 kgs of thin worsted yarn (I think he said it was 2/56, but it doesn't really matter), both from an industrial outlet.

Black is hopeless to photograph, at least to a hopeless amateur like me! The fabric has a nice drape, which may (or not) show in the picture.
The yarn is posing on the table of one of my sewing machines, and lies beside a cotton 22/2.

On the way home, I visited an exhibition (no water spouts in sight, but it rained).
This was labelled as an "area rug", and the pattern is just brushed. The attendant assured me it was not fixated(?) in any way, which means one can't touch it without destroying the images. Not very practical, but impressive to see all the detail the artist had managed to "brush in" (click to enlarge).

10 minutes from home, there were double rainbows pointing at my house, but as I was driving these will have to do:

Worsted, sort of

Second sample was combed, still unwashed. That was not very wise - even that small amount did gunk the combs up. I could not find the diz, so I used a nice abalone button instead.



It was more difficult that I remembered to spindle the combed fibre - or, maybe, I'm just out of practice...



Plied and washed it definitely has more worsted character than yesterday's sample. Some loft, a lot less elasticity.



Visually, they are not as different as I thought they would be.



I plied both yarns fron a center-pull ball, something I avoid when spinning "for real". Maybe the spinning direction is more important for worsteds than for woollens, but I think it makes sense to try to preserve the direction always. And yes, it means that, when I unload a spindle I first make one ball, then make a new one, just to get the direction right.

Now I really need to make that washing frame I have planned - or maybe I should just go for mosquito netting, while this nice drying-weather still holds.

1:st homegrown yarn!

Finally, I managed to sort my first homegrown fleeces. They were shorn months ago, but temperature and weather were against my doing it earlier.
First, perhaps, a portrait of the "donors" - they are two old Finn ladies. They aren't interested in getting their picture taken, but here's one and part of the other:


It will be some time until I get the fleece washed, but I wanted to spin a couple of small samples all the same.
This is the first - carded and "spindled":




After plying and washing it looks like this:


This small sample is approximately 10 wraps per centimeter. It came out nice and lofty with lots of elasticity.

Next sample will be combed, I think.