Scarves

Handwoven Scarves

I love weaving and wearing scarves. I use commercially spun silk yarn for most of my scarves. This weaves into light fabric which washes well and does not crease much. I also use alpaca, cashmere and merino.

My best selling scarves in 2008 were woven using two strands of silk for each warp thread and several strands of fine silk for the weft. The warp was dyed using a type of ikat technique before it is woven

Doubling the silk threads means that they can be woven further apart. (12 threads an inch rather than 20). This means that they are quicker to make.

They sell in the range £50-£65.

	I also weave scarves using two threads of lambs -wool and and one of silk for each warp thread . I use a variety of types of thread for the weft
	In November 2008, I used a strand of baby alpaca, a strand of alpaca merino blend and a strand of silk for the warp for two scarves. For one of them I used four strands of find silk for the weft and for the other strands of silk cashmere mix and fine alpaca. I cannot bear to part with one of them!

In 2007 I started weaving wider widths for wraps or Ruanas (like a poncho but open in front)


I have included red to represent berries in a Winter Garden. The warp is double knitting wool and the weft alpaca/wool blend	This represents daffodils and bluebells in the spring gardern. The warp is lambswool and silk and the weft silk

My autumn ruana being woven on my Mighty Wolf loom

For wraps and scarves , I normally weave two or three scarves on the same warp. Even so these scarves take me on average about 20 hours to make. Dyeing, setting up the loom and finishing off take longer than the actual weaving.


A 20 inch all silk wrap. This half of the warp was blue and green. and I used I fine silk weft. These wraps are selling quickly	The other half of the warp was meant to be blue, purple and pink but I made a mistake and dyed a section green> It was a happy accident as it sold on the first day of my exhibition in December2007

I also weave scarves using other luxury yarns

The warp of this scarf is is alpaca and the weft silk and cashmere

I have a selection of scarves that have been woven from woollen knitting yarn which take me a total of about 4 hours to make.

This scarf sold at £25. This price is possible because it is quick to weave and I have used odd balls of knitting wool which are available cheaply.

In 2007 I started to use the ikat technique to dye the warp and in 2008 I made four scarves using varied spacing for the warp which makes the twill wave (Pictures to follow)

Last updated 03/08/2009