Alternating Aurora Towel

Designed and woven by Barbara Stucke

Alternating Aurora Towel

Designed and woven by Barbara Stucke

I have been weaving for almost two years now and wanted to recreate the first towel I made, which I wove with #3 Crochet Thread. I loved the colors and thought I would like to have bit thinner towel and so I warped up the loom. This towel could be anything as far as colors and plaid pattern and pick up pattern. It is so much fun to experiment and see what happens. I love the texture the simple pick-up pattern makes!

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What You'll Need

Materials

Warp: Maurice Brassard 8/2 cotton in Natural (375 yds), Charcoal (200 yds), Vieux Blue (100 yds), and Lime (175 yds)
Weft: Maurice Brassard 8/2 cotton in Natural (175 yds), Charcoal (100 yds), Vieux Blue (200 yds), and Lime (150 yds)

Equipment

Directions

Warping

Direct warp 90ʺ following the warp color order below. You could also adjust the colors to make them your own.
Sley the reed as usual. When you get to the sections where there are different colors every other slot, thread one color through all the holes and the other through all the slots.

Insert the Pick-Up Stick

Place the heddle in the down position.
In only the sections outlined in red, go over 2 and under 1 with your pick-up stick. Note that you may not always complete a full repeat at the end of a section.

Weaving Pattern

down
up with pick-up stick
down
up
Always repeat all 4 picks—weft colors may change in the middle of the repeat.

Weaving

Wind a shuttle with each of the colors.
Leave a tail of Natural that is about 5 times the width of your weaving for hemstitching.
Weave 38 picks following the weaving pattern in Natural.
Hemstitch in groups of three warps and three wefts.
Weave 40 picks following the weaving pattern in Vieux Blue.
Weave 9 picks following the weaving pattern in Natural.
Weave 7 picks following the weaving pattern in Charcoal.
Weave 9 picks following the weaving pattern in Natural.
Weave 20 picks following the weaving pattern in Vieux Blue.
Weave 5 picks following the weaving pattern in Natural.
Weave 40 picks following the weaving pattern in Lime.
Weave 5 picks following the weaving pattern in Natural.
Weave 30 picks following the weaving pattern in Charcoal.
Weave 60 picks in plain weave alternating between Vieux Blue and Lime.
Weave 30 picks following the weaving pattern in Charcoal.
Weave 5 picks following the weaving pattern in Natural.
Weave 40 picks following the weaving pattern in Lime.
Weave 5 picks following the weaving pattern in Natural.
Weave 20 picks following the weaving pattern in Vieux Blue.
Weave 9 picks following the weaving pattern in Natural.
Weave 7 picks following the weaving pattern in Charcoal.
Weave 9 picks following the weaving pattern in Natural.
Weave 40 picks following the weaving pattern in Vieux Blue.
Weave 38 picks following the weaving pattern in Natural.
Hemstitch the end of the fabric in groups of 3 warps and 3 wefts.
Leave 8" for the fringe.
Repeat steps 2 to 25 for the second towel.

Finishing

Remove the towels from the loom leaving at least 4" of warp at the beginning and end for the fringe.
Twist the fringe using 2 hemstitching groups.
Trim the fringe to whatever length you’d like. I did about 1".
Wash and dry towels using your preferred method and enjoy!