Camp gamps

63 twill variations for weaving ideas and inspiration

Twill gamp #1

Seven weavers each brought a portable loom. Each was threaded with three different twill patterns separated by two threads of a contrasting thread. Those are the vertical lines in the photos. 

As mentioned in my last post, each weaver wove three different treadling sequences, weaving two picks of a third contrasting color to separate one patterns before moving to the next.  sequence. Those are the horizontal lines in the photos.

Two days. Seven samples. Nine patterns on each gamp. Sixty three variations on twill.

Twill gamp #2

Twill gamp #3 (Incomplete sample)

Twill gamp #6

Lessons learned

In the workshop, each weaver tagged her gamp, which brings me to a cautionary tale. If you use white tags to identify designs and patterns, make sure they can survive your finishing method. Tags that disintegrate in water are a big problem for fabrics that need wet finish and/or blocking. 

Twill gamp #7

These gamps weren't woven for beauty. Time was tight and weaving, as quickly as possible. That meant that selvages weren't as tidy as they would be in a finished piece and minor mistakes were ignored. That extra white line in twill gamp #6? I lost my place in the treadling order and rather than undo the picks, I marked the point of error and kept weaving.

The master plan was that weavers plan to weave on their loom last, so that if time ran out--as it did, they could finish the sample at home. 

The gamps shown here have all been wet finished by hand washing (in Dreft), rinsing and ironing when dry.

Evaluating patterns

Some patterns appeal to me more than others, but I can see at least one design potential in each of the gamps. Some, I've discounted due to floats that would make the fabric unstable. (Note the middle section in Twill gamp #2.)

Twill gamp #6, at left, looked very different after wet finishing. Just off the loom, the squares were distinctly square, but not after finishing. Were I to use any of those twills, I'd  need to make sure I either beat lighter or planned for significant lengthwise shrinkage.

Others I'm disinclined to weave because the results aren't significantly different enough to justify weaving a three-pick color pattern. That was true for twill gamp #3 on which progress was slow and I was running short on time. I ended the pain and moved on.

Now that these are finished, I'll put them in a notebook with their threading and treadling patterns and add another valuable addition to my fiber resource library.

*Extra marks if you noticed that #4 and #5 are missing. Time ran short. Number 5 is on my loom to be woven and shared with the person who didn't get to it and #4's loom owner has promised to weave off an extra gamp when she does hers. 

Gamp camp

A workshop with no relationship to Sarah Gamp's brolly.

8-Harness Schacht with twill gamp begun

Odd word, gamp. According to oxforddictionaries.com and every other online resource I found, 'gamp' is a British colloquialism for an umbrella that derives from Charles Dickens' character Sarah Gamp, a nurse with a large unwieldy umbrella in Martin Chuzzlewit. I found not one reference related to weaving.

Yet gamp is a real word used by weavers to describe a sampler--and samples are as essential to weavers as gauge swatches are to knitters. (If you know the origin, please share!)

On the loom, fibers, colors and patterns don't always behave as expected. And the time to find that out is before the project is warped, the loom dressed and the weaving begun.

Gamp camp in Medford

Last weekend, the South Jersey Guild of Spinners and Handweavers hosted a weekend workshop with Karen Donde to explore the possiblities of color-and-weave effects in twill patterns. Seven of us arrived on Saturday morning, each with a loom dressed with 5/2 cotton in two contrasting colors. There were four- and eight-harness looms, each threaded with three different patterns across the 12 inch width and ready to weave.

Ashford table loom

This was a round robin event, meaning that each person wove a sample on each of the seven looms. For those who didn't own a portable/sample loom, it was an ideal opportunity to try out different maker's equipment. I particularly liked the Louet, which had its own stand, and the Ashford table loom (at right). I have an eight-harness Schacht table loom and stand that M. built for it. (Works a charm, but confused some people because the levers are right to left. Are they still made that way? I don't know.)

Each loom was matched to a treadling pattern with directions for three different treadlings, which resulted in nine different variations for each twill gamp. 

At the end of the second day, the fabric was cut from the looms and cut apart so that each participant several twill gamps. After I secure the ends and wet finish mine, I'll share photos here.

Vintage table loom

Why do this? To find patterns suitable for upcoming projects, of course. Among the nine options, there is likely to be one--or more--that look promising. Gamp are not end projects. Rather, they are resources for future projects. It's a beginning. Most (all?) projects will call for changes--fine-tuning, if you will. Different colors, yarns, beat, etc. 

Weaving a twill gamp is a good exercise. Handweavers Guild of America provides directions for threading and treadling a twill gamp here.