Roger's Sash

I've been working on a sash for friend, Roger. It will be part of his Metis regalia. Roger provided his uncle's as a sample. Sorry I did not photograph it. It was cotton, 8.5 inches by 6.5 feet with about 10" of fringe on each end. Roger suggested website resources for me: metistradingpost.com and sprirtualnetwork.net. I also visited virtualmuseum.ca and metismuseum.ca. I met w Michael at Halcyon for input. Michael suggested using wool. Apparently the Hudson Bay Company made loom woven sashes based on First Nation designs. I read that the fringe ends were sometimes used as source for thread for small sewing projects. The sashes had chevron or arrow designs. I thought that twill would be great for my interpretation.

I spent hours fiddling with the threading and coloring. I had done some twill before and threaded in the reed unevenly so creating an undulating feel to the finished piece. I integrated the technique here. This took plenty of trial and error ande reminded me why so many handweavers give up. The threading can be tedious and frustrating, especially when in learning mode!

Rogers sash (pictured) is 166 ends of cotton rug warp, threaded randomly in a 10 dent reed. I made the warp 5 yards long, so I would have plenty to experiment with. I finally settled on black weft of same yarn to give a nice finished look to the edges. Total time to set up loom and weave, minus all the experiments, took 7 hours. Finished size is 6 inches by 7 feet, plus 4.5inches of fringe.