A Final Farewell to Phoenix

Yes, I know. You all have seen the struggle. Phoenix has been through a lot of ups and downs, literally. This final time of resurrecting her and giving it one more try was eye opening for me. I have to finally admit from the heart, this big loom really doesn't work in my life anymore.

I got about half way through putting a warp on her and the challenges began. In the past, I had no problem working through the challenges, but now things are different. At first I thought it was because it was summer. Summer means I am outdoors painting or gardening. The weaving guilds always took a break during the summer months as we were all so busy.

Fall came along with storm after storm. Perfect weaving weather but, it just wasn't meant to be at this time. It is also perfect weather to work in the art studio, catching my breath and honing my art skills.
Phoenix takes up so much room and I am always tripping over her or squeezing around her to get to my drawing table. Alas, she crowds my art making. I have come to a fork in the road where I have to make a choice, art or weaving. I do not have time to do both justice, only one. Art will always win out.

So, this is it. The final attempt to sell her. If I don't sell her, she will be re-purposed into studio furniture. In fact, I already have ideas in mind. While it may seem a shame to turn a rather expensive loom into furniture, it will still be used to further my creativity plus, have you seen the price of art studio furniture these days? I will be getting good quality handcrafted furniture for a decent price! There will also be bits and pieces that will be sold or given away separately.

I still have my 8H-Jane table loom. I am not through with weaving forever. I love it too much.

Here are the details complete with my lowest asking price yet.

For Sale!

 

AVL Modular Loom: 60 inches wide

$1,000.00 firm

Please note: This is not a dobby loom! It is a modular production loom that can be converted to a dobby loom with additional equipment from AVL.

Loom includes the following:

 

·      8 Harnesses

·      60” Single Box Flyshuttle Beater

·      Fly Shuttles and Pirns

·      60” 1 Yard Sectional Warp Beam

·      Tension Box for Sectional Warping

·      Track and Mounting System for Tension Box

·      2-60” Reeds, 15 and 12 dents/inch

·      Yarn, misc. accessories and more!

     The loom currently lives on the Northern Oregon Coast and would need to be picked up (Sorry, it isn’t feasible to ship). The loom is currently assembled and will be disassembled as needed for transportation. 

The loom could be delivered to the Portland Oregon area for an additional $500. 

If interested please contact me at rdelight_latorre (at) hotmail (dot) com.

Finally, the loom will be for sale until the end of December 2015. Not much notice I know but I really need to have the space back. 

Thank you all for your kind support of my journey over the years. It has continues to be a joy.
-Renee

AVL Loom Update: An Aha Moment

My 60" AVL Modular loom

I have listed and re-listed this beautiful loom and even lowered the asking price. I even recently contacted AVL about the possibility of a buyback and got a polite "thanks but no thanks" and advice to try selling it elsewhere. I resisted sending a detailed reply to their advice. I have been trying to sell this loom, on and off, for the past 5 years or so.
As I sat pondering what to do next, I kept thinking in "if only's". If only I had a place to set it up, if only it was smaller, if only...
Then it hit me. If I was prepared to make it into furniture at one point, why couldn't I just make it smaller, say a 36" width instead of 60"? I jumped online and did a bit of research. I found manuals on AVL's website for some of their home looms. Looking through manuals and thinking outside of the box, my conviction grew. Yes I can!
So, I have a summer project! I will resize the loom and restructure my studio. I really do miss weaving. I won't have a lot of time to devote to the fiber arts as painting and fine art takes up the biggest chunk but I have an hour a day I can sew, spin, or weave. I just have to organize and make sure things are easy to get to and I can jump in and out of the fiber projects quickly.
One of the reasons I did so well with this loom, even though I had never woven on a loom when I bought it, is because I love to tinker. I am in for a major tinker on this one! At this point I feel I have nothing to lose.

I plan to start in June and will be posting the progress!

-Renee

Phoenix Rising

Happy New Year! Guess what has been added back into my life for 2012? Give up? Nah, you probably guessed. I am bringing back weaving into my life after a few years off. I took a couple of weeks off to think about what direction I needed my life to go. We have had such a roller coaster ride the past few years and settling here on the Oregon coast has allowed me to catch my breath and re-evaluate. My loom has been in pieces and has been in storage and then stored in places here and there in the house. I came to the conclusion that I needed to either sell it (try to sell it, again that is) or use it. The problem is, the loom is not exactly...um...compact. Before I share the pictures, I have to break off a minute and give a shout out to the weaver's spouse everywhere. I have found that in general they are wonderfully supportive of their weavers and put up with tripping over a lot of large equipment and fiber. My spouse is definitely one of these. The only way I could set my big loom up was for us to move out of the lovely large upstairs bedroom and into what was previously the painting studio and a wee bit smaller. He didn't even blink, in fact, he was the one who suggested it. A weaver's hero!  I have spent the last week packing, scrubbing carpets and walls, moving it all upstairs, setting up our bedroom downstairs and rebuilding the loom. Our "new" bedroom is cozy and clean and the loom is built. I still have stuff to put away but I will be able to paint tomorrow. Here are a couple of photos:

Oh yeah, for those who don't know, the loom is a 60" AVL modular production loom with 8 harnesses and a single box fly shuttle. The loom grows up to be a 16 harness dobby loom with the addition of some rather expensive parts. I hope to eventually acquire those parts but that is a future post.
Up until now, she never had a name but now it is obvious, her name is Phoenix.
The loom was in even smaller pieces than what was originally shipped to me. I am the one who has built it, deconstructed and packed it, and then rebuilt it. I believe it is important to know how my loom works. The re-building went faster as I knew how it was supposed to go and I did a careful job when I took it apart. Everything was labeled, hardware was bagged and labeled and not a piece was missing. Nothing was broken, dented, or scratched, which was rather amazing. I have a couple thousand texsolve heddles that I had carefully removed and tied. They went on fairly easy but, there are a lot of them so it took a bit of time. I am pleased to say my hands remembered exactly how to handle them fast and efficiently. The feet of the loom are cushioned with layers of non-slip padding and area rugs protect the exposed wood floor.
So, I had hoped to be able to get the warp on tomorrow but I still have a few things to put away and I have to rebuild the spool rack and find my bobbin winder. To start with, I have two 18 gallon bins of yarn, all of it cotton, linen, or rayon. I am going to be focusing on plant fibers and some of the human constructed fibers such as rayon and bamboo.
I still have a lot to say but I will save that for future posts. Renee Weaves! is back in addition to continuing my art blog (click on the "paint" link above). The weaving blog has a new look and will have a slightly different focus and direction. It is a new year after all! I have removed the glossary and a few other things and will be adding different things along the way. Most of all, I will be posting about weaving and selling handwoven items.
Thanks to those who hung in there, and to those who are returning or are new. Please feel free to leave comments and stay tuned!
Until next week,
-Renee