變色花帽 blooming floral hat

This week I finish two hats made of hand-woven fabric. The fabric has UV thread as weft. Therefore the white hats will "blossom" under sun light. It is cheerful to have these accessories when we saw so many disastrous news recently. It was a cloudy day when I took the photos. The color of flower will be stronger if  it is a sunny day.
這星期用手織布縫好兩頂帽子，因為緯線是變色線，所以白帽子在陽光下會「開」出彩色的花朵。特別在看到那麼多天災的新聞後，看到色彩的變化能讓人稍微開心一點。拍照那天其實是陰天，所以色彩淡了一點。

手織書 Woven pages

The work of this week was warping a white warp to replace the transparent warp on the Jacq 3G at home. This is the advantage of having double warp beams. A regular yarn is much easier to winding and knotting!! The first trial of this white warp is a woven book. There are four pages woven today. The symbols are brocaded. You can find the back of the fabric has long float. That is the characteristic of the brocade fabric. The lower part of the fabric is a test weaving for finding aspect ratio, proper weft and setting the auto cloth advance system. The Jacq 3G has auto cloth advance system which I like very much. The pages are soft and thick which are very different from paper.

這星期把家裡的提花機整上新的白經線，另一捲透明經線只用了一點點，還是先暫停。因為有雙經軸，所以可以這樣處理。經常整奇怪的線材後，會覺得一般的線材實在太好整經了！！！通常一個人間隔整經20多碼、30英吋寬，包含捲線、綁線等步驟，約需要兩個工作天。先嘗試「手織書」，今天織完四頁。注音符號的部份是用夾織技法，從布的背面可以看到浮線，這是夾織的特徵。布塊的下半部是測試，用來找出正確經緯比、適當線材及調整緯密控制的設定。Jacq 3G 有緯密控制器及自動捲布機制，如果一開始設定好，織作時會很暢快，是我很喜歡的功能。今天織完四頁，手感和紙張很不同。

front  前面

back  背面

after stitched  縫合後

無奈的雪莉 Shally is not appreciated

據說「許多常見的貓狗，也會時常輕啣著子女以示親愛」？！

今天試著做狗媽媽，但無法用嘴輕啣著雪莉，所以用手代替，但是雪莉似乎不很喜歡！
An article said that dogs and cats will use mouth to hold their kids to show their love!(?) Today I try to do that to Shally (not my mouth, of course). She is not appreciated.

坎坷的最後一片 Difficult ending of the project

 Finally the first panel of "Wall of Tree" was re-woven. When I started to weave this piece, I knew the length of the rest of the warp was not so sure; but still wove it. It was very difficult to weave the final part. The short warp made the warp thread lifting very hard and had uneven tension. A new idea came to my mind. In stead of cutting the old warp before tying a new warp; do the tying first, then keep weaving the old warp to its very end. From the photo below you can find this situation. I don't recommend this way of weaving. Because I don't have time to re-do this piece again, therefore this is an alternative way. I did get the length I need.

終於重新織完第一片，過程有點坎坷。在織這片時已經知道所剩經線長度有點危險，還是織看看。果然到最後的30公分時，經線張力不均，實在很難織。突然想到改變以往的做法，先把所剩白經線和黑經線一支支先接好，然後繼續把白經線織到最後，才結束白經線的部份。剛接好線開始織的時候，經線張力亂七八糟，只好儘量調整。最後終於織出約300公分長的布塊。

After tying two sets of warp, the weaving kept going. 把新、舊經線接好後，繼續織。

The piece was finished. The black new warp was drawn through reed.

終於織完，新的經線拉過鋼筘，然後下機。

Keep weaving

This is the last panel of this "Wall of Tree" project. There are 5700 picks to go. After two panel were woven, I decided to re-do the first panel. The first panel is way too short compared with other panels.

織完第二片時，決定要重織第一片，因為和其他片比起來實在太短。現在已經是最後一片，還有約5700道緯線、兩個工作天。

織完第一片 The first panel was finished

The first panel was finished yesterday. The length is 280 cm!! My design is for three meters high and four panels to make one image. What's wrong? I forgot to add the shrinkage of the warp and the beating is too heavy. It must be careful to control the other panels to match this height. Even though we need to weave test piece to find the aspect ratio of every Jacquard work, the ratio we get will not always 100% accurate. Beating, weave structures and the size of the thread will affect the aspect ratio. If the work is long, the inaccuracy of the ratio will show dramatically. Like this case, the work has 20 cm shortage. If this is a public art or commission piece, I would re-do the weaving. This happened couple times before.
昨天第一片織完下機，一量長度是280公分！！設計是四片三公尺長拼組成一個畫面，現在其他三片要小心控制成和第一片尺寸相近。可能經線的縮率忘記加進去，也可能打緯太重。在織作提花織物時，一定要先織一小段測出經緯比，再依此數字去計算整件作品需要多少道緯線。但經緯比會因打緯力道大小、織紋結構分佈的情況而改變，特別是織一小段來測，總會有誤差。作品短時，有誤差時不明顯。如果作品長時，微小的誤差可以累積出出驚人的長度，就像這次的情況。如果是公共藝術或訂製的作品，那一定要重織，這樣的事就發生好幾次。

雪莉的快樂時刻 Shally's happy time

Shally likes to play on the grass of our campus. It is her happy time.

雪莉喜歡在學校的草皮上玩，這是她一天中最快樂的時候。

The big project reaches two-third of first panel. It is similar to the last one, white ground with steel, luminous and UV thread. If you don't feel bored, this is how it looks on the loom.

今天的進度已經到第一片的三分之二，和上一件作品有點類似──白底和銀色圖案。