On the first weekend of every December, historian and weaver Rabbit Goody holds an open house at her workshop, Thistle Hill Weavers. I dropped in this morning, and had a wonderful time! I took pictures, too.
Rabbit remembered me, much to my delight. The first thing she said to me was, “Did I answer your question?” Last month I had attended her talk and then her flax spinning class at the Northeast Handspinners’ yearly open house, which I blogged about here. I had emailed her afterwards to ask a follow-up question to her talk, and she knew my face went with that question. It was very cool.
The entrance to the building had a small room featuring textiles for sale, as well as a display of the work she’s done for films.
The workshop itself is very loud, and that was only with two looms actively running. She had several power looms, from the 1890s through the 1940s. I bet when they’re all going it’s deafening. I noticed the huge box of disposable foam earplugs — I’m not surprised they buy in bulk.
Here’s some of the looms and equipment.
Jacquard loom:
I took a short video of the loom in action.
I found the technology of it fascinating, as it’s run by computer now instead of the original punch cards. As a programmer, I’d love to know more about both the software and the hardware. The company that creates the patterns is a different one, and the weavers put it on a thumb drive and stick it in the side of the tablet.
There were lots of other power looms.
I chatted with the weaver working on this next loom. The fabric is for wool jackets, being made for a place that sells reproductions. I asked the weaver how long he’d been working at Thistle Hill. He said five years. I would have loved to ask how he got into weaving, but I didn’t want to bother him too much.
This was a loom for making trim.
This is a quill winder. The quills go in the shuttles.
This was the setup for measuring out warp. The cones (left) feed into over to the warping mill (right) after passing through a tensioning device. It’s sectional warping, which I’ve done before on a hand loom (my old Macomber, actually). Although the warping beams for these looms aren’t sectional like modern hand ones are. They just get taped onto the beam in order once the sections are all on the mill.
I bought a copy of Rabbit’s book on pattern weaving, and got her to sign it.
And that was my trip to Thistle Hill! I had a wonderful time seeing all the equipment and how they make old equipment work now. I imagine they have to have replacement parts machined specifically for the looms, since I doubt they can find parts easily. I should ask about that sometime…
0 Comments