A Krokbragd Study Group

I am participating in a Krokbragd study group with some of the members of the Skagit Valley Weavers Guild. What in the heck is Krokbragd? It is a Norwegian weave that is essentially a 3 shaft Twill. For those of you who may not be weavers yet, your blue jeans are woven in a twill weave structure. Take a close look with a magnifying glass and you will see a very characteristic twill weave. Krokbragd uses three shafts of the loom. We met at Jeanine's house as she is the weaver who is conducting the study group and weaves incredibly beautiful Krokbragd rugs. Here is a sample:
She has a nice large weaving studio in her house and we were able to crowd our looms in to weave.
We first met around the table to discuss the weave structure, what it is and how to weave it. All of us arrived as pre-arranged with our looms warped up. If you look closely at the picture on the left, my loom is the wee little loom between the two back looms on the table.
Krokbragd's most striking feature is the color patterns that you get with this weave. If you love color it is a lot of fun to weave. Here is Anna in action:
My little loom is a Dick Blick Artcraft loom. They don't make them anymore. The loom is so tiny, it really isn't good for a whole lot but perfect for trying ideas and new weaves out. Here is what was on my loom at this point:
I happened to find four skeins of wool rya rug yarn in my stash which was fortunate because I was so distracted by the holidays I forgot to make sure I had weft yarn for the workshop! Considering that my stash is down to the bare minimum, I was lucky indeed.
We had a wonderful time. It had snowed that morning but the roads were passable. We spent a wonderful day warm and snug while weaving and chatting. For a weaver who usually weaves in solitude, it doesn't get much better than that. The final picture is another rug that Jeanine has woven. It is a bit more complex that what we were doing and the skill and beauty of the rug is really breathtaking. The picture can never do it justice.
Thanks to Jeanine, Anna, Marie, Gloria, Sue, Elinor and Carin our Krokbragd study group is off to a good start! More information on Krokbragd can be found in The Techniques of Rug Weaving by Peter Collingwood, and Handwoven magazine. Stay tuned for more weaving adventures. -Renee