sweetgeorgia

Top 5 for 2007

I’ve been holding out. I’ve really been holding back from writing this post for a while. This is SweetGeorgia’s 4th annual Top 5 list… you can see 2006, 2005 and 2004… but those old posts seem so irrelevant now. Michelle and I frequently remind ourselves that 2007 is “the year that never was”. 2007 was supposed to be a year of chrysalis… of breaking down, blowing everything apart, re-examining each and every one of the shattered remains and then beginning to rebuild… consciously. It’s a year of rebirth.

Many of you were so supportive earlier this year when my workload and general life difficulties caused me to crumple in a sobbing, drowned lump of a girl formerly known as me. I am grateful for the time and space I have had this year to re-evaluate and thoughtfully consider what is important in my life and what is not. This year allowed me to make some painful but essential choices… among them, the choice to slow down my design firm of ten years so that I can pursue my work in textiles. Dyeing, weaving, designing… and yes, SweetGeorgia Yarns.

So, here is my Top 5 for this year. SweetGeorgia Yarns will re-open in 2008 with new products, new colours… new ideas and new ideals. But I need your help and your input… tell me…

1. What do you love about SweetGeorgia Yarns?
2. What do you hate about SweetGeorgia Yarns?
3. If you’ve purchased from us, what made you compelled to? If you haven’t purchased from us, why? Price, availability, retail distribution…
4. What would you like to see us offer? What kind of yarns, fibres, colours… you name it.
5. How important is pattern support to you? What kind of patterns are you interested in?

Of course, I will be sending one randomly selected responder some gorgeous, naturally dyed yarn. Please send me your thoughts BY EMAIL to info [at] sweetgeorgiayarns [dot] com by Monday, December 31 at midnight PST.

So, this is me. At the end of 2007. Looking forward to new beginnings. A brand new life. This is me now, but it won’t be me next year.

And this is indigo-dyed bombyx silk warps. It looks like a mess now, but I swear, it’s gonna be beautiful.

It’s what’s for dinner.

On the menu today, iron overdyed hemp yarns. Tasty.

For dessert, I think we’ve got some indigo overdyes too. Mmm.

Attraversiamo

Attraversiamo. So, apparently this means literally “to cross over”, as in “hey, let’s cross the street”-type usage. I learned this lovely new bit of Italian last night from the book by Elizabeth Gilbert, Eat Pray Love, where she simply gushes about how much she loves this word. How beautiful it sounds. How delightful and Italian it is. It is her most favourite word in Italian.

This morning, I pass by the silk scarf currently on my loom. It is bathed in light. It actually seems like it’s emitting light… even in this soaking wet grey Vancouver weather. And I notice the beauty and profound effect of “crossing over”.

The yarn used here for the “crossing over” or the weft is bamboo yarn with several dips of indigo. It took me several attempts at first to find the best yarn to cross with this warp. The warp is varied and mixed up, with one side heavy with fat and chewy turquoise silk singles to the other side where several slim strands of osage and iron dyed silk peek out. Sprinkled throughout are the bumpy bits of silk boucle, bursting from the surface of the fresh woven fabric.

Initially for wefts, I had tried an ethereal, kid mohair laceweight yarn dyed in pale turquoise, but the core yarn disappeared into the warp stripes and all that was left was residual haze. Crossing it with something stronger like 20/2 silk only made it look and feel weft-heavy.

But this bamboo seems to fit perfectly. The warp is turquoise, warm blues, aqua greens, and even maize yellows. The indigo-dyed bamboo is still a warm blue, but less so than the warp. A cool blue, even. And so the colour shift that happens when you cross the two is the most appealing thing about weaving. It is the relationship between the two — seemingly disparate — colours that is magical. The best fitting weft will merge with the warp… not disappearing into it and not overwhelming it. But it will colour and shade the warp and produce something that makes the warp even more beautiful. The weft is subtle, complementary and supportive.

I’m pretty sure Gilbert didn’t have anything about fabric on her mind when she wrote about this. But the analogy seems so obvious to me: that the person you choose to cross over with should be, in overwhelmingly simply terms, a good weft. That this person should merge and blend with you in such a way as to create a more beautiful life.

Attraversiamo. Let’s cross over. There’s something better on the other side of the street.

Some days I want to gough my eyes out.

And other days, I am saved by the beauty in things like this:

It’s 100g of 20/2 cultivated silk. First dyed lightly in weld. Then dyed in marigold. And finally overdyed in madder. It’s absolutely gorgeous in the skein. And I am grateful for the light it brings into my life. When all else is dark and despondent, I am thankful that I can see and see beauty in something as simple as colour.

Swimming in colour.

Dyeing small skeins of silk in natural or chemical dyes over the past few months has resulted in an incredible assortment of colours and textures that seem to complement each other. Leaving them on their own seems unnecessarily limiting, so the mixed warp is the way to go.

This past year at the Maiwa workshops, I took year 2 of Michele Wipplinger’s Colour Institute. The three-day workshop covered how to incorporate “light” into your work. Contrasting textures, lustruous textures, luminous effects, iridescent effects, or even the combination of colours in a certain way. These mixed warps are overall one colour, but have tiny proportions of (relatively) complementary colours to spark the mix. I’m trying to get away from the all monochromatic colour palettes and explore something just a bit more complex. But complex or not, I just like how these look.