Bon(e) Appétit! Table Setting
By Benjamin Krudwig
Halloween has been, and always will be my all-time favorite holiday. Whether it's the candy, or the fact that for one night a year you can dress up as anybody or anything you want to be. Although I have grown out of the trick-or-treating, I have not grown out of the love of the spooky holiday. Now that I am a "grown-up" and due to the wishes I have heard in our Wolf Pack group on Ravelry, I decided to make a table setting set.
I thought about motifs that would be both graphically interesting, and indicative of Halloween. One of the first images that came to mind was a skull. I thought about doing a block-weave skull that would be large, but decided I wanted a finished fabric that you would have to get close, to see what the pattern was made of.
Using the iPad software iWeaveit, I played around with a few different designs before settling on one that worked. I started weaving, and didn't quite like the pattern, so I went back to my draft and made some adjustments. Since my pattern was based around the tie-up, and the Baby Wolf makes it so easy, I was able to quickly make the changes and start weaving again.
Project Specs
Weave structure: point twill
Warp length: 5 yds (includes take-up, loom waste, and shrinkage) for 4 napkins and a table runner
Total warp ends: 174—120 of Silver and 54 of Purple
Width in reed: 14.5"
EPI: 12
PPI: 12
What You'll Need
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Valley Yarns Valley Cotton 3/2 in Silver Birch - 600 yards.
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Phoenix Dye Works, 85/15 Cotton/Nylon Blend in Common Wealth "Purple/Black." - 700 yards. (This yarn was an old one from my stash; it measured around a 3/2 weight, so you can substitute a 3/2 cotton with confidence.)
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8-shaft loom with at least 15” weaving width
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boat shuttle and pirns—I used a 15” end delivery shuttle
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rotary cutter, cutting mat, and straight edge for trimming fringe
Materials
Equipment
Directions
Warping and Weaving
Warp according to the weaving draft. Start with 4 ends of purple, then alternate 5 ends of silver, 2 ends of Purple until you reach the last repeat, end with 5 ends of silver and 4 ends of purple.
For napkins: Weave 4 picks of plain weave, stop to hemstitch, weave skull pattern for about 12.5", then weave 4 picks of plain weave, hemstitch. Leave at least 4 inches in between each napkin.
For runner: Weave 3 inches of plain weave, then weave skull pattern for another 2.5 feet, weave 3 more inches of tabby. Weave with an even beat to achieve regularly shaped and spaced skulls. I did not keep an even beat the whole time which resulted in some squished skulls and others that were more elongated. To me this made it look more irregular and spooky.
Finishing
For each napkin, topstitch the fabric along the hemstitching. Cut fringe to 1-¼”.
For runner, fold up the ends to create a hem. Sew with a straight stitch to secure.
Wash and iron all pieces.