Painted Roses Scarf

This one began as a three heddle rosepath project, but after most of a year in hiatus when I returned to weaving it I was totally over the novelty of wrangling three heddles. So I untied the warp, pushed off the little bit of weaving I’d done, and rethreaded with one heddle as plain weave.

The rosepath wasn’t the only effect I had intended for the scarf. The warp was a painted skein. I laboriously adjusted the warp length as I threaded the loom so that the colours aligned. So this has become the Painted Roses Scarf. The effect is subtle thanks to the weft being a similar red to that in the warp, but the weft also has a bit of glitz in it, adding a hint of shimmer to the final piece.

Matching the colours made for a shortish scarf, but some people prefer that.

Cutting up the flannelette scraps for use in rag rugs is done.

I’d estimated it might take a month. Instead it took about 12 hours, spread over two weeks. A lot more scraps had already been cut than I realised. I also weighed the strips and did the math to work out how long a rug each batch would make, and chose warp colours to match. Next I need to sew the strips together, then fold the edges in using and iron and a bias tape maker. From what I recall, the sewing is fast but the ironing is slow.

I had a mild feeling of de-ja-vu during the last four days of cutting, as I’d done the first big batch of cutting during the first lockdown in Melbourne. Thankfully both cutting and lockdown were much shorter this time.