Weaving in Beauty

From left, Ellen, Kathy, Carol, Joy, Francoise, Angie, Mary, Ann and Niccole at the Fiber Factory

Mesa, AZ Last Saturday, I did my semi-annual dye class for the Fiber Factory in Mesa.  We take a full day and use cochineal, indigo, madder and osage orange.  Since this combination includes all of the primary colors, theoretically we can derive any color on the color wheel.   Although both indigo and cochineal were used historically in Navajo weaving, only a few weavers use them today because of the time and expense involved.   D.Y. Begay and Roy Kady, in particular, use these and other non-native dyes to differentiate their work and to extend their control over the color possibilities available to them.

In this class we got a particularly vibrant pot of cochineal and believe you me, those bugs did not live in vain.  This particular batch of cochineal came from Aurora Silk and with some stanous chloride (tin) mordant and citric acid in the bath, the reds, corals and pinks were seemingly inexhaustible.  We also got some beautiful terracotta shades, teals, deep blues and even a couple of impressive purples (cochineal overdyed with indigo).    Of course you can look into the dye pot (see below)!   I’m going to need to get bigger pots for next year because the class is so popular.

Third or fourth batch of yarn in our cochineal pot.

Hagoshíí (so long for now)

Mary Walker

D.Y. Begay demonstrates natural dyes Navajo style. The wool she's holding is dyed with Navajo tea.

Phoenix, AZ Moving down the Heard Museum’s courtyard at the Gathering of Weavers last Saturday, I smelled Navajo tea and then saw D.Y. Begay with her dyepots.  Also called kota or greenthread, the Navajo tea plant is used to make a beverage as well as a dye for wool.  Depending on the type of pot used, the mordant applied and the amount of time that the wool is processed, the plant yields colors ranging from gold to burnt orange.  D.Y. was also processing some brazilwood and walnut hulls.  Weavers who do their own dyes are always exploring the color potential of various plants.  At a lecture that I attended on Saturday afternoon, Jackson Clarke told the audience about arranging to have Ella Rose Perry, a master weaver and dyer, do a demonstration for an event in Utah.  Grandma Perry was way overdue and when she arrived she explained to a worried Jackson that she’d been stopping at various elevations to collect plants that she just could not get at home!   A picture of a section of  one of Grandma Perry’s rugs appears below. The gold color in this rug is Navajo tea.  Look at how skillfully Ella Rose has used the Crystal weave in the striped areas of this rug.

A section of a Crystal Rug by Ella Rose Perry

Right behind D.Y.’s dye demonstration, Lola Cody was doing a warp the Navajo way.   If you look carefully at the picture below, you’ll see that she’s using her loom as a warping frame and that she’s ensuring that she her warp dimensions are even by using pipes rather than dowels.  What you can’t see as easily is that the warp is (now sit down) hand spun Navajo-churro wool. Fellow weavers, I am here to tell you that this warp was absolutely beautiful.  That warp was so strong and evenly spun.   Lola let me hold the ball  in my hand and I knew that the courtyard was too crowded for me to make a clean getaway, plus there were a bunch of people there who knew me and I want to stay friends with Lola.  I handed the warp back to her.  Yep, I’m going to try spinning my own warp.

Lola Cody demonstrates warping the traditional Navajo way with handspun Navajo-churro warp.

Barbara Jean Teller Ornelas was working on a matched set of four tapestry grade miniature Chief Blankets.  When it’s complete, the set will include two First Phase patterns, a second phase and a Third Phase.

Barbara Jean Teller Ornelas works on her set of four Chief Blanket miniatures.

You’ll want to see Barbara’s work and her loom set up in the picture below.  You’ll see that the First Phase blanket pattern (left) is composed of stripes and the Second Phase adds nine carefully placed blocks that would line up when worn.  The Third Phase piece will have diamond design elements in place of the blocks.  These small pieces will have about 100 weft threads to the inch.

We’ve worked our way down one side of the courtyard, but there are some new weavers for us to meet tomorrow and you’ll also be interested in some of the rugs that Jackson Clarke and Mark Winter discussed in their talks on Saturday afternoon.   Look for that update on Wednesday; I’m helping with a weaving class tomorrow weaving.  If you’re near the Fiber Factory in Mesa, AZ, stop by and say hello.

Hagoshíí (so long for now)

Mary Walker

Berdina Charley with two of her weavings (left). Berdina's sister D.Y. Begay's weavings are at right

D.Y. Begay’s sisters, Berdina and Berdine are getting serious about their weaving and brought some of their work to this year’s Indian Market.  Berdina’s work, seen above in the two pieces in the left of the picture has strong graphic impact and a contemporary focus.  Every time I look at the pictures, I find that I like Berdina’s designs more.  Her weaving skill is phenomenal too, but she’s got good genes.   Berdine was away from the booth when I was here, but I think you can see one her weavings at the lower right in the picture above.   I’ll have to catch up with her at another show.

D.Y.’s Shadows of Cota is to the right of Berdina.  It’s dyed in many shades of Navajo tea, which is also called cota or greenthread.  The color produced depends on the mordants used, the length of time in the dyepot, and maybe a little bit on how much tea you pour into a pitcher for later before you start using it for dye.   There’s a somewhat closer view below and a close-up of the weaving detail that shows D.Y.’s unique weaving style and the fine gradations of color that she uses.  What may look like pixelation in your monitor is actually rows of color carefully chosen to achieve the visual effect that D.Y. is looking for.

D.Y. Begay with Shadows of Cota

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Shadows of Cota detail

My coffee cup is empty and there are rugs to be washed and fixed.  Let’s visit with more weavers tomorrow!

Hagoshíí (so long for now)

Mary Walker

Yarns dyed with various types of bark. From top left, osage orange, logwood purple, brazilwood, and sandalwood (bottom)

A couple of times a year, I do dye classes for the Fiber Factory in Mesa, Arizona.  Last weekend, we worked with various bark dyes and walnut hulls.   Contemporary Navajo weavers like D.Y. Begay and Roy Kady also use some of these exotic barks, but traditional Navajo weavers have used mountain mahogany, black walnut and alder barks to produce color for generations.   The trick to achieving maximum color extraction from many bark based dyestuffs is low temperature and long processing.  I started soaking some of these materials a full three days before the class, and I could have started a week before.

The pink color that we achieved came from brazilwood chunks, and they could have easily been soaked for a longer time and the yarn could have been left in the dyebath overnight.   I started the brazilwood with a rubbing alcohol oxidation process per Bjo Trimble of Griffin Dye Works.  I usually work with brazilwood sawdust, which is easier to coax maximum color out of because it is not as dense.  We also used a similar process with the sandalwood powder that produced the terra cotta color in the yarns at the bottom of the picture.  The yellow color came from osage orange sawdust that was simply simmered for about 30 minutes.  The purplish gray and purple came from logwood extract, which I’m always reluctant to use because the color is quite fugitive.

We got some wonderful deep browns from the walnut hulls,  which were in pieces and which I’d soaked for a couple of days before the class.  The hulls can be soaked for literally weeks and can be reused again to produce different tones of brown and butternut tan.  We used both alum and copper as modifiers from the walnut colors, which you can see in the picture below, although the sun was so bright that some of the walnut dyed yarn looks black.  This coming weekend, I’ll be doing another class on madder, cochineal and indigo.  If you’d like more information on natural dyes, check the Griffin Dye Works site and Jenny Dean’s excellent Wild Colour blog.

The walnut hull dyed yarns at at top and bottom.

Mary Walker

Phoenix, AZ I was out of town during the Gathering of Weavers on November 1 and Roberta Sauerwein graciously offered to write an article and take pictures of the event. I’ve heard heard that the event resulted in several sales for the weavers. I’ll be sure to let you know if it will be repeated next year. Here’s Roberta’s report followed by a gallery of the pictures that she took at the event.

Saturday, Nov. 1, was a lovely day for the Gathering of Weavers in the tree lined central courtyard at the Heard Museum in Phoenix, AZ. The entire area was filled with weavers of all ages and tables covered with beautiful rugs of every style and colour imaginable. Gilbert Begay had several small rugs made from handspun, hand dyed yarns. He is also making small handbags from natural coloured yarn. Nathan Harry was weaving a round rug with natural handspun on a bicycle wheel. Marie Dedman had a beautiful Second Phase Chief’s Blanket and a Germantown Revival rug. Helen Edwards was demonstrating the hand spinning that is used to create lovely natural dyed rugs. She made it look so easy. Valerie Allen was demonstrating dyeing with walnuts. D Y Begay was demonstrating dyeing with Sandalwood and Navajo tea. She was getting a beautiful orange from the tea. There were also several of D Y’s beautiful rugs as examples of the range of colours that come from natural sources.

Just outside the courtyard is a newly finished mosaic mounted on the wall. It is a representation of a D Y Begay rug titled Floating Weft Mosaic.

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All pictures are courtesy of Roberta Sauerwein.