Spread Your Wings and Try Something Different

The fable Ella Minnow Pea, written by Mark Dunn, takes place on an island named in memory of Nevin Nollop, whom locals revere as the author of the sentence “The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog.” A memorial statue sits at the center of town with his pangram spelled out in tiles.

One day, the letter Z falls off and shatters. After much discussion, the High Island Council decrees that Mr. Nollop is speaking from beyond the grave. His message: Z is to be forevermore excised from the island’s written and spoken language, on penalty of punishment. Some days later, the Q falls off.

As more letters fall and the island’s alphabet strictures grow, residents adapt their language. The story, which takes the form of a series of letters between the islanders, shows the same gradual shrinking of the alphabet. In writing it, Mark Dunn used the literary form known as a lipogram, which intentionally excludes particular letters from a work. It’s a kind of language game for a writer—a creative dare.

What does this have to do with weaving?

We posed a similar challenge to designers in this issue: Anything but Twill. All the various twills (straight, point, broken, undulating, plaited, advancing, irregular) are ubiquitous—for good reason. They can be simple or complex, balanced or not, with almost unlimited variations in threading, tie-up, and treadling. Everyone loves twills! We even asked Madelyn van der Hoogt to write an overview of twills, which you’ll find in this issue.

But our creative dare, just for this issue, was to focus on projects using other structures. And the designers came through with wonderful work doing just that. This issue includes plain weave, diversified plain weave, stitched doubleweave, honeycomb, summer and winter, barleycorn, taqueté, and satin damask.

Speaking of satin damask, that project—the Vis-à-Vis Runner on our front cover—commemorates the fifth anniversary of Long Thread Media. It was designed by Sheila O’Hara, a longtime contributor to Handwoven. We hope you’ll weave it and celebrate along with us.

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Inside the Fall 2024 issue

Twill-free handwovens! From left, Robin Monogue's Taste of Sonoma Scarf in barleycorn; Rebecca Fox‘s Dizzy Drones Honeycomb Pillow made using retired jeans; and Annette Swan Schipf‘s Taqueté All Day tote.

In this issue, you’ll find ten tempting projects in corduroy, summer and winter, barleycorn, honeycomb, taqueté, and more, to energize and delight you.

Whether you live for bright (or subtle) colors, are intrigued by curves, find yourself drawn to a particular texture (we’ve got smooth, fluffy, and satiny), or have knitting stash to deploy, there’s a project here for you.

Owner Anne Merrow catches you up on Handwoven’s robust new life. In Notes from the Fell, Tom Knisely writes about old-fashioned laundry tools—and the one he still uses while finishing handwovens. Yarn Lab tests out a silk that weaves into cloth with incredible drape and hand.

Left: Make a custom finnweave scarf to celebrate your team—Claudia Tokola walks you through the process. Right: Yarn Lab tests out Gist Yarn‘s Sero silk, and the results will have you putting in an order for a cone or three.

Are you a big sports fan? We‘ve got an article explaining how to make a custom scarf with your team’s logo or graphics. You can also follow one weaver’s journey from the most complex loom to a simple rigid heddle, and another’s experience teaching adults with disabilities.

Online, you‘ll find three bonus subscriber projects as part of this issue: a sophisticated drapey scarf with an overall pattern grid, a towel with a border that‘s just right for the season, and a scarf that celebrates family heritage.

The Fall 2024 issue of Handwoven is available here.

Do you have a minute to help me out?

We provide downloadable WIFs and lift plans for projects in each issue. Have you ever downloaded any of these? If you have, I‘d appreciate hearing how you used them. Did you adjust the WIFs to personalize your projects? Use them to drive a computer dobby loom? Use the lift plans with a table loom or a manual dobby loom? Or some secret other use that you‘re eager to tell me all about? Please email me at handwoven@longthreadmedia.com. Send your weaving questions and comments to that same address.

And since you‘re emailing me anyway, here‘s a bonus question: What’s on your loom right now? Please send me pictures, or show us on Instagram or Facebook by using #handwovenmagazine.

Happy weaving!
Lynn

Lynn Rognsvoog is the editor of Handwoven.