Reno Fiber Guild had a slow start to their regular guild program year because of a recent fire near Mt. Rose.  However, we were rewarded with a nice October meeting in which Judy Hilbish was our guest speaker. Judy is a weaver with over 50 years experience.  Her focus for many years has been weaving rugs and assorted weft faced, summer and winter pieces on Heidi, her much adapted counter marche loom.  Judy studied the shaft switching device devised by Peter Collingwood in his book, Rug Weaving Techniques:  Beyond the Basics and set about to make one for her loom.  ..read more

 This is a continuation of projects that study group members did as a results of their study about shadow weave.   Ingrid K. took a twill line and used a Fiberworks' feature to create the parallel threading on 16 shafts..  Her tie up reflects the Lang & Voolich method described in their monograph, “Parallel Shadow Weave”.     I (Beryl Moody) did my experiments on a draft from Marian Powell's book 1000 (+) Patterns In 4, 6, and 8 Harness Shadow Weaves.  My processes have been recorded, along with photos of my towels and drafts, on my personal blog ..read more

 The article that follows is from weaver, Anne Shyjean of Grass Valley, CA.  She doubled her efforts using both the RFG study group and Complex Weavers Study group for Early Weaving Drafts and Manuscripts.   Background and Processes in Weaving Shadow Weave from an Historical Document                                                                               by Anne Shyjan  I am ..read more

Reno Fiber Guild and some CNCH guild members have been studying color-and-weave and shadow weave for the past five months.   I thought it would be nice to see the fruits of our labors over the summer.  The first projects were woven by Karen W. from Foothill Fibers in Nevada County, CA.  These are a  series of color and weave towels. See what Karen says about her project. My color and weave project was a set of kitchen towels inspired by the May/June 2023 Handwoven Mid-Century Modern Runner by Merriel Miller. This is a 7 shaft pattern which has repeats of the same color ..read more

Weavers are always looking for new skills through workshops or self study.  New weave structure, new loom, new technique, new color combinations; the list goes on and on.   This post is about members who put in the extra effort and allow themselves to be beginners again.  Note - you can click on the photos to get a better look at the details! Suzanne W. I thought I’d share a photos of my finished Swedish Art Weaves (Scandinavian (Skane) Folk Art Sampler from a workshop with Joanne Hall at CNCH 2023 Cal Poly.  Although the workshop was August 2023, I didn’t get back to ..read more

  Our March meeting was led by guild member Jennifer Jay.  Jennifer was awarded a scholarship to attend CNCH 2023 and her choice of class was one led by Polly Giacchina - The enhanced twined form".  After Jennifer had practiced the various techniques she had learned in the class, she challenged herself to share them with guild members.  Jennifer brought two techniques to the hands-on-class.  Coiled basketry and knotless netting.  She made little kits for everyone in the class with materials suitable for learning the basics of both of these sculptural forms.  ..read more

This year's party was especially welcome since we had to cancel the one last year because of bad weather.  We also changed our gift policy from a raffle basket(s) in which just one, two or three people won a basket full of gifts, to an old fashioned exchange in which everyone who brought a gift, received a gift.  For this year's gift exchange, the theme was to bring a handmade fiber gift.  You didn't need to have made the gift, as long as it was handmade.     Anni tries on her new knitted cap, made by Shereé.   Paulie's gift was made by An ..read more

  Reno Fiber Guild members were treated to a dye workshop with Diane S. (former co-owner of the Just Our Yarn Company).  Diane showed us the methods she used when dyeing skeins for her former company.  The skein she is holding up in the photo  at the left isn't her method.  Instead she showed us how to paint a few different colors on each skein in a more random pattern.  The photo to the right is the array of dyes prepared for us to use.  There were so many choices, it was hard to pick just a few.   These are skeins painted by Anni B.  They w ..read more

 It turns out that a turned beiderwand threading will give you lots of options.  You can do turned summer and winter and its variations and double weave on your beiderwand warp.  And, you can also change the ratios of pattern to tie downs by changing your tie ups.  Here are a few more photos of some of the variations Karen's students woven in the workshop and also several links that may be of interest to our readers. https://chgweavers.org/turned-beiderwand-with-karen-donde/  https://www.weaversguildmn.org/news/learning-turned-biederwand  https://karendondehandwov ..read more

 Here is a collection of photos from the Turned Beiderwand Workshop given to Reno Fiber Guild members by Karen Donde.  Each weaver is represented by their first name only to protect their privacy. Turned Beiderwand Ratio 1:3 woven by Deb   Turned Beiderwand Ratio 1:2 woven by Diane Turned Beiderwand Ratio 1:2 woven by Joan Turned Beiderwand Ratio 1:3 woven by Karen Turned Beiderwand Ratio 1:3 woven by Kathy   Turned Beiderwand Ratio 1:4 Woven by Maggie More photos in the next post ..read more