A few months back when I was preparing for the weaving demonstration, I relied on some very old books, instructions that came with a mini inkle loom, and YouTube to work out how to weave tape. The only broad guide on the subject I found wasn’t published yet. But I preordered it anyway, and it arrived a week or two ago:

It’s a bit of a revelation, actually. Did you know you can weave inkle tubes? Well, I didn’t. Before it arrived I was feeling rather innovative having started an inkle using silver lurex thread. Now I have a lot more inkle weaving techniques to explore.

Once I get Japanese beadweaving out of my system, that is. I finally finished a piece. It took longer than I expected – several hours working in half hour/hour long stints to be kind to my back and hands:

It didn’t work out quite as neat as the picture in the book, but that’s to be expected. I wasn’t using the specified beads, which are evenly sized, but some leftovers in my jewellery box. The twist isn’t as tight as it should be, but I get the feeling that this sort of beadwork is a bit like knitting in that it takes practise to get your tension even.

I’m not 100% confident that the threads won’t eventually pull out of the ends, either. I wove two rows on each thread, so I didn’t have meters of thread getting all tangled as it went through each bead, and this meant I had about ten threads to deal with at one end rather than one to neatly wind around a clasp then sew back into the beads. I took the ten threads through a bead cap and some black beads, doubled back then tied them around a bead within the cap. I suspect I should glue that knot.

Despite all this, and despite gold not being a colour that suits me, I’m rather pleased with it and have lined up another project.