northern range rugs
Warp: Seine twine #9
* 100” warp
* 88 ends, sleyed every other dent on an 8-reed (4 EPI)
* Straight threading (1-2-3-4)
* Plain weave
Weft: Northern Range Wool (1 1/2 skeins Steel Grey, 1 1/2 skeins Cactus, 1 1/3 skeins White)
BORDER
40 picks grey (Color A)
MOTIF 1a
11 picks white (Color B)
10 x (1 green (Color C), 1 white)
4 white
4x (1 grey, 1 white)
4 white
10 x (1 green, 1 white)
10 white
MOTIF 1b
11 picks green
10x (1 grey, 1 green)
4 green
4x (1 white, 1 green)
4 green
10x (1 grey, 1 green)
10 green
MOTIF 2
20 grey
3x (1 green, 1 gray)
1 green
3x (1 green, 1 grey)
1 green
4x (1 green, 1 grey)
19 grey
FINISHING
* tie bundles of 4 warp strings with an overhand knot, push town tightly to the weft edge, trim to 1”
* hand wash in warm water with wool wash, lay flat to dry
FINISHED SIZE
18” x 57”
NOTES:
* I had to use a rug temple in order to get a tight enough beat. Even with a temple, it was really difficult to pack down the weft yarns, and I had to beat each pick multiple times. The key seems to be keeping the warp threads tight enough, but in order to do that, I had to continuously wind the warp back a little ways onto the back beam to tighten everything up, because the repeated heavy beating caused the warp threads to loosen up quickly.
Blues rug:
-- 100” warp in seine twine
-- 99 ends
-- 4 EPI on 8-reed
-- threading 1/2/3/4 and tie-up 1/3 and 2/4
-- weft: Northern Range in colors Admiral Blue (Color A), Elephant (Color B), and Azure (Color C) (2 skeins/ea)
-– same pattern as greens dot/dash modification version above
Finished size: 20” wide x 54” long
Second greens rug:
-- 90” warp in seine twine
-- 120 ends
— 4 EPI on 8-reed
— thread 2/1/2/1 . . . .2
— plain weave on only two treadles (tie-up to 1 / tie-up to 2)
Weaving pattern:
-- 40 picks grey
-- 60 picks white
-- 20 picks green
-- 40 picks (1 green / 1 white)
-- 20 picks green
-- 60 picks white
-- 20 picks grey
-- 16 picks (1 grey / 1 green)
-- 8 picks grey
-- 16 picks (1 grey / 1 green)
-- 20 picks grey
-- 60 picks white
-- 20 picks green
-- 40 picks (1 green / 1 white)
-- 20 picks green
-- 60 picks white
-- 40 picks grey
(repeat bolded section)
FInished size: 24” wide x 38” long
Notes: For some reason, I struggled more with getting the weft firmly packed enough with this rug, and I had to waste a lot of the warp cranking it tightly enough before I even started weaving. I’m not sure if this is because I made this rug wider, or if it’s something about how I’m winding the warp - not getting enough tension when I’m winding it onto the back beam. As a result, I had more threading errors on this one, and it came out much shorter than I anticipated.