Many of my fellow weavers have been creating such beautiful fabric using the deflected double weave structure. To be honest, I’ve been a little intimidated with this structure. It took some time for me to wrap my head around that, with a certain tie up, you could actually weave two very separate layers of fabric and then intertwine them at will. It wasn’t until just this month that I think it finally clicked and now I’m feeling much morer confident weaving with this structure. Before getting sharing my sampler, let me share with you a few resources that have been helpful.
Resources for Learning Deflected Double Weave
“Deflected” or not, the double weave concept just blew my mind. Having a floor loom I found myself often just tying up and following the treadling pattern without really understanding what was actually occurring in the cloth as I wove. This is what happened with this structure- not fully understanding how I was getting the results I was getting was holding me back. It took a few projects weaving just basic double weave and then venturing into deflected double weave before I had the ah-ha moment.
I am a member of Jane Stafford Textiles School of Weaving. I credit Jane for the vast majority of my skill as a weaver. Her online classes (only $99 a year) have been invaluable. In season 3 (Pushing the Boundaries of Plain Weave) Jane introduced the double weave structure. As the season implies, it was with simple plain weave. In season 8 Episode 3 (Deflected Double Weave) Jane dove into deflected double weave. Since I have an 8 shaft loom, I was able to weave the scarf using the wool/silk blend (Zephyr).
In the same season (Episode 4), Barbara Mitchell presented block double weave. That episode was helpful as well in understanding blocks specifically. Well, then, I moved on to other things- other projects and other structures- and deflected double weave sat on the back burner. I had a beginning understanding of double weave, but it was far from cemented in my brain.
During the last few weeks, as my loom sat empty, I decided to give it another go. This time I came across workshops on Long Thread Media. I first watched Janney Simpson’s two lessons, Experiments in Deflected Doubleweave and New Dimensions in Deflected Doubleweave. These workshops were great companions to Jane’s lessons as they went more in depth on using different yarns and how the yarns shrink (or not) to create different effects. Watching Janney weave on a table loom and manually move the shafts helped me to better understand exactly how double weave worked.
Another workshop that was very helpful was Madelyn van der Hoogt’s Weaving Deflected Double Weave. Like Janney, she gives guidance for mixing different yarns to get different effects in the cloth. Madelyn’s use of this structure is very artistic and shows you how push the boundaries of the structure.
My Deflected Double Weave Sample
For my sample, I used the framework and the skeleton tie up for deflected double weave that Janney introduced in her workshop. The sampler was woven using wool/silk (Zephyr) and 10/2 mercerized cotton sett at 30 ends per inch. There were 10 ends per block. The threading for the blocks are as follows: Block A: 1212121212/ Block B: 3434343434/ Block C: 5656565656/ Block D: 7878787878. Blocks A and C were threaded using the Zephyr and B and D the mercerized cotton.
My tie up was as follows: ABCBA/DCBCD/ABCA/DCBCD….. again, 10 ends per block with a total of 250 ends. This ended up to be 8.3 inches in the reed.
Once on the loom I experimented with weaving two separate layers- insane, right?- before moving to a tromp as writ.
I decided not to use a floating selvage and to try to get the hang of moving the shuttle either up on top or below depending on the next block woven. Janney demonstrates this in her lessons. Madelyn’s workshop uses a floating selvage and Jane shows you both options. I think it’s just a personal preference. It took a while to get the hang of weaving without the floating selvage, but I like the look better so I’m going to stick with this method. After weaving tromp as writ, I experimented with alternating blocks: ABABABAB/BCBCBCBC/CDCDCDCD/DADADADA.
I then wove ABCDABCDABCD ending then with Tromp as Writ and two separate layers.
After cutting the sampler off the loom, I twisted the ends and measured. Off the loom the fabric measured 7 3/4 inches W and 39″ L not including the fringe. Following Madelyn’s directions for finishing, I put the fabric in warm/hot water with Dawn dish soap and aggitated it for about 10 minutes. The aggitation and the warm water makes the wool “full”. Using two fibers- one that shrinks and one not- gives the fabric a unique texture. I love it! I then laid the fabric flat on a towel and let it dry over night. The next morning I brought out my steamer, put the sampler between two damp cloths and pressed.
The final dimensions of the sampler was 6 3/4″ W and 36″W- 7.5% shrinkage in length and 12% in width.
I’m really looking forward to experimenting more with DDW. I have a few more projects I need to get to not using this structure. I’m only hoping that I can remember what I’ve learned so far.
