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A couple of weeks before I acquired my table loom, I was on my way to a movie with a friend, when I passed by Indigo books in Montreal. (Okay this is not the Indigo store in Montreal, but I am allowed to use this image! 🙂

Weaving was very much on my mind during my walk, as I was dreaming about what I would weave with my new loom, so I popped in the store to humorously see what weaving books were in stock.

I say humourously because there are never any weaving books in stock. I ocassionally see some in American bookstores, but the market here for such things is pathetically small, so I was expecting to find nothing and idle the rest of my time away in the magazine section.

But, unbelievelingly enough, this is what I found in the crafts section: Jennifer Moore’s book on Doubleweave by Interweave Press! This was no beginning weaving book – it was a specialized weaving technique that really doesn’t belong in a mainstream Canadian bookstore 🙂

I couldn’t believe my eyes. I pulled it out of the rack and ran to my friend to tell her what I found. My non-weaver friend just had a blank stare on her face, thinking I had gone totally mad.

And I had. That book came home with me that night and I skimmed through every section before going to bed.

Double weave allows you, among other things, to weave a folded fabric that is, once off the loom and unfolded, wider than the loom can physically handle. Which, if you have a narrow loom, opens a new world of possibilities – my table loom would suddenly be capable of making shawls or pillow coverings!

There is one main catch when making a wider fabric: You need to divide your loom’s harnesses in two in order to manipulate the upper and lower layers as you weave. This means that a four-harness loom can only weave a 2 harness pattern (plainweave) in doubleweave, and if I want to design a doubleweave cloth on my 8-harness table loom, I’ll be limited to 4-shaft patterns.

You can also create a tube of fabric (great for bags or purses), or make patterns that appear in reverse on the other side of the cloth. (Double weave pickup allows you to make any design you want, free of restrictions). You can also connect the two layers of fabric to make an extra thick and cushy cloth. The layers on one side can be exchanged with the other at any time, for a variety of effects.

I am looking forward to giving this technique a try sometime soon!

(and yes, anyone who knows me knows that the geek in me would totally make a QR code doubleweave scarf as shown below 🙂 QR3D doublewoven http://www.textilecentermn.org/ (Photo credit: RuTemple)

