Woke up bright and early to make my way across the bridge to Queensborough Community Centre for the Repp Weave workshop taught by Rosalie Neilson from Oregon.  The building is in a beautiful park-like setting, and the sunshine poured through the large window wall.  The large room was a wonderful open space for the workshop with the only bump being the very noisy playschool in the room next door competing with Rosalie’s voice.

In preparation for the workshop I chose my colours, black and natural, of 3/2 mercerized cotton for the warp and thin weft, and white mop cotton for the thick weft.

Then I measured my warp, 348 ends, and sleyed and threaded my loom in blocks with pairs of black and natural in plain weave pairs: Block 1 -white on 1, black on 5, Block 2 – white on 2, black on 6, and so on.  The warp was sett at 30 ends per inch.

Rosalie taught us how to tie on to the front beam with a lashing thread, and then taught us the theory of block weave.  In the afternoon, I played with the different block combinations.  My workshop loom is a Jane Loom from Louet.  I think that this loom was not so happy with such a heavy and densely sett warp, and I am having some issues with the shaft cords jumping to the neighbouring pulleys and jamming up.  However, I am pleased with the results of my afternoon weaving.

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