We had a great retreat in Taos. Spinning for Tapestry is a fun subject and my co-teacher Jillian Moreno* is a joy to work with and learn from! I always pick up new tips from her. For example, this retreat was about color and involved a lot of parallel drafting. Talk about magic!!
The weather was fantastic and there was time spent spinning (or napping) in the sunshine.
Judy and Mary spinning outside in the sunshine
We had six days of fun where we tackled different ways of making color in spinning and with tapestry techniques. This was the beginning of the second day where we worked with tint, tone, and shade
Spinning for Tapestry retreat with Jillian Moreno and Rebecca Mezoff. Preparing for tint, tone, and shade day.
And the next day the color really exploded. We were parallel drafting and plying and trying all sorts of combinations before even going to the loom.
Spinning for Tapestry retreat with Jillian Moreno and Rebecca Mezoff. Color just exploded by day #3.
Everyone approaches this kind of content differently and no one finished everything in the time we had. The below photo is of the very organized Nancy’s table where she has some yarn spun and some waiting to go.
Nancy’s planning kept paying off!!
The image below is Jillian’s parallel drafting sample plus a singles spin which illustrates all sorts of things, but my goodness you can get some very cool effects just by how you split a braid.
Jillian’s sample of parallel drafting. Pretty awesome, right?
There were looms to warp and lots of questions and playing with sett. Because of course your default handspun is unlikely to be perfect for 8 epi. Below Lynda and Janie are warping Janie’s new Mirrix Little Guy.
Lynda and Janie working on warping a brand new Mirrix Little Guy.
Here are more photos of the smiles some dedicated fiber time can bring.
Nancy and Kim doing some Andean plying.
Mary and Judy in a final goodbye to Jillian.
Rebecca, Kim, Lynda, and Christine ready to head home for another year.
Have I mentioned that the food at Mabel Dodge Luhan House is amazing? Chef Sophia and her crew are just fantastic at what they do. I can’t have gluten and what you see there is a plate of gluten free sopapillas. Can you even believe it? Martha has made me them in the past and Sophia pulled through again this year! I was over the moon thrilled by this.
Rebecca and Jillian enjoying the last night’s dinner.
And as we usually do, we took a field trip to Taos Wools. Joe Barry had sourced some churro fleeces and most of them went home with someone. Of course his beautiful wall of yarn was well picked over and I got to visit my tapestry, Emergence I again. It sold later that week.
Joe Barry, owner of Taos Wools, sourced some churro fleeces for the class to pick from. I think most of these were gone by the time we left!
I won’t tell you how many Jillian went home with. Jillian, Liz, Mary, Janie.
Judy and Bronwen looking at the churro yarn.
Rebecca Mezoff, Emergence I, 48 × 48 inches, hand-dyed wool, cotton tapestry; as seen at Taos Wools
This was a marvelous group of people. Here is our class photo from this year.
L —> R: front row, Rebecca, Nancy, Jillian, Janie, Trish, Anne. Middle row: Christine, Judy, Kim, Pennie. Back row: Bronwen, Mary, Liz, Lynda, Linda, Harriet. What a great group!
And of course there were all sorts of shenanigans. Jillian and I had bibs day again. Her rainbow frogs reminded me of Portland, OR’s protests recently and I’m going to have to get myself a colorful pair of overalls for the next time we do this.
Jillian and Rebecca on “bib's day”
Jillian Moreno with some of her fantastic samples and her infectious laugh.
The retreat was held at Mabel Dodge Luhan House in Taos, NM. I recommend a stay there if ever you can manage it. Often they have last minute rooms because they tend to hold blocks for the conferences they host every week. But if you call a few weeks before your trip, you might just luck out with a night or two in this quiet historic house. There is nothing better than a little time in front of the kiva fireplace in Mabel’s living room and waking up the next morning to enjoy a fantastic breakfast prepared by their chef. I have stayed in most of the rooms in the historic house at this point and they’re all sweet, quiet, and relaxing. There isn’t any wifi nor are there refrigerators or air conditioning, but it is a place to dive into some New Mexico history and relax for a bit. More info is HERE. (And of course I teach tapestry there a couple times a year, so watch my schedule/newsletter for your next opportunity!)
*If you want to learn about spinning and especially color use, seek out Jillian Moreno. Her book Yarnitecture is excellent and she teaches all over the USA and the world. She leads retreats recently in the UK if you want a fantastic fiber tour. Her website is HERE.