For this week's weaving class, we got to play around with Log Cabin and Shadow Weave, and I was not looking forward to it. Years ago, as a new weaver, I warped up some ungodly amount of cotton which was to be a set of log cabin towels for my mother. Log cabin was easy, I was told. It's just plain weave, after all. What could be so hard? I wove two of the towels, which took me weeks. I kept inadvertently switching shuttles, skipping threads, my selvedges looked like they were following the path of the Mississippi, and I was not a happy weaver. The rest of the warp was woven off with a single weft, and hidden away somewhere. Never again, I vowed.
So when Judy said, it's log cabin, it's basically plain weave, it's easy, I groaned inwardly, but took careful notes, came home, warped up a tiny 2" wide warp for bookmarks, and started weaving while holding my breath, waiting for the headaches to start.
I'm still waiting.
I'm not sure if it's all the weaving I've done in the meantime, using a different loom, not trying to make everything square up perfectly, a better understanding of why it works, or just the universe biding its time, but I really enjoyed the log cabin, and have a number of ideas for projects using it now. I went a little wild playing with the wefts to see what might happen, but it was fun.
Warp: 10/2 cotton in black and natural, sett at 24 epi.
Wefts: 10/2 mercerized cotton, 5/2 cotton, cotton boucle and tape, Zephyr wool/silk, and whatever else was in the loom bench at the time.
Shadow weave was described as log cabin grown up, with many of the same characteristics: alternating colors in the warp, a two shuttle weft. Every shadow weave project I've ever seen has been with smooth yarns at a fine gauge, usually with closely related colors, so I decided to go to the other end of the spectrum. I warped up two bumpy cottons, a white textured and a navy slub, at 12 epi in a Swedish Rosepath twill. The three mug rugs in the center are the result (so far -- there's more warp on the loom, but those are all I finished in time for class).
Shadow weave is intriguing. Many of my classmates, being much better weavers, did more traditional type shadow weave projects, much subtler than mine. You don't always get what you might expect from the parent pattern. Drawdowns can be a headache, which is why I skipped them and trusted that the rosepath would undoubtedly provide me with something I could learn from. You do have to pay much more attention to your weaving than with log cabin, as every pattern throw needs its corresponding shadow, but it isn't too bad. I wrote out throw by throw directions for the first two, then just worked directly from the twill pattern for the third. I may even improvise for the next one. After all, if worst comes to worst, they can always join that first pathetic log cabin project in the closet.
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