Ask Madelyn: Sleying Handspun Yarn

Dear Madelyn,

I am in the process of weaving a blanket from my own handspun yarns. I determined the sett should be 5 epi. This would allow for the inconsistency in the handspun without making the finished product too dense and heavy.

I am using an 8-dent reed, and following the reed charts I found, I sleyed it 0-1-1. But I discovered that instead of the 48" weaving width I had calculated, it ended up being 45". Upon some further reading and research I found that sleying 0-1-1 in an 8-dent reed actually gives you 5-1/3 epi resulting in the difference in width. I found a website that suggested a sleying pattern of 0-1-0-1-1-1-0-1. Would you recommend this odd combination?

—Joan te Bokkel

Hi Joan,

No, I wouldn’t sley in that order. I would try to distribute the threads a little more regularly, as in 0-1-1-0-1-0-1-1. I don’t see any reason to put those three threads together.

It is very odd that the reed charts list that sett as 0-1-1 (I see we do in The Weaver’s Companion, too!). Maybe the thinking is that you’d do that grouping for eight dents and then start over, even though you haven’t finished the third set of three. So you’d do 0-1-1, 0-1-1, 0-1, and start over. That distribution would be essentially the same as the one I suggested. Both require you to count eight dents before you repeat, however, which is a bit of a pain!

—Madelyn