Rebecca Mezoff Blog — Rebecca Mezoff

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Small tapestry looms: which one should I use?

Small tapestry looms: which one should I use?

For my small tapestry work and for teaching on small looms, I have used Hokett looms for many years. Jim Hokett retired in 2019 and though I will use my personal stash of these looms forever, those of you who didn’t manage to get one before he retired are looking for other options.

Why would you want to weave on looms like these? I’ve written about this a lot on this blog, but the short answer is that small looms are less intimidating. They tend to allow us to play with yarn and ideas without feeling like we’re making something monumental. I think that helps us drop our own expectations and allows us to learn without shame because what we’re doing might not match the image we had in our head. They’re also portable, less expensive, and they don’t use as much yarn as big looms.

I have four great options for you and I am sure there are others out there. I’ve woven on all of them and I can recommend them all for various reasons.* All four of these looms are made in the USA, many of them completely by hand. Please remember if you’re ordering a hand-made loom from someone that they most likely won’t be able to get it to you as quickly as a large commercial operation could. Be patient. Make or buy another loom while you wait for your treasured heirloom equipment. For example, you could purchase a Schacht loom or make a copper pipe loom (links below) while you wait for one of the other three looms.

Vanishing Fleece: The story-telling of Clara Parkes

Vanishing Fleece: The story-telling of Clara Parkes

Clara Parkes has a new book and you’re going to want to go get it right away. It is called Vanishing Fleece: Adventures in American Wool. It came out the first of October and I spent my evenings that week reading it. If you are a fiber person and you aren’t yet a fan of Clara Parkes, I recommend taking a look at her work. She is doing advocacy for the fiber most of us love the most, wool. She is asking the questions about the wool industry in the USA and worldwide that need to be asked and with this book, she is actively looking for answers about how to save this fiber we need so much. I heard her speak on this subject when she was the keynote at the 2016 YarnFest in Colorado when she was on her book tour for her last book, Knitlandia.

In Vanishing Fleece, she tells the story of what she calls the Great White Bale. She came by a 676-pound bale of the finest Saxon Merino wool and decided to use it to explore the yarn industry in the USA. She divided the bale into four parts and had them spun in four different ways at four different mills in the US. She also explores dyeing at a range of dye facilities.

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Fall in Colorado: weaving leaves

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Fall in Colorado: weaving leaves

The leaves are changing. In fact, after the snow we had last week, they’re probably mostly done. I’ve taken a few high-altitude hikes lately to enjoy them and found the colors inspiring for tapestry design. Of course the design process always starts with photos when it involves a place I’ve been though sometimes the final weaving looks nothing at all like the photo. I’m usually interested in the feeling of the place more than depicting it in woven form. These sorts of inspirations usually get approached first in my tapestry diary.

The end of September we went to Pingree Park (those of you who come to my CSU Mountain Campus retreats know it well). There is a broad swath of aspens surrounding the campus and they were brilliantly yellow and orange that week. I was still pretty tired from my east coast trip, so we only hiked about 6 miles through the leaves enjoying the sunshine.

The photoshoot: making a book

The photoshoot: making a book

Making a book is quite an endeavor. I went into my current book project with little knowledge about the book-making process. I had done the Untangled self-published book so I had some idea that lay-out and having something printed isn’t quite as easy as it sounds. But I’ve never created a 300+ page how-to book before. My eyes have been opened over the last year in sometimes startling ways.

So far I’ve learned these lessons (at least that I’m willing to admit to):

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The saga of the tapestry postcard

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The saga of the tapestry postcard

The title of my postcard is Waypoints. I’m including photographs here because I don’t think they’re going to make it into the ATA show which is quite disappointing actually… but entirely my fault.

I started this piece forever ago. With the intention of actually finishing it of course. I was planning ahead, sure I’d get it finished and mailed before the end of the summer, determined not to be the last person in the show to mail their card. Partway in I had an idea I liked better for the theme but I was lucky to get this one done, so the new design will have to wait.

I determined, mostly from photographs I took likely with this very blogpost in mind, that my original intention was to finish this piece that is on my biggest copper pipe loom before starting the postcard for the ATA exchange. I do remember looking at this piece, thinking that I didn’t much want to cut it off but neither did I want to finish it (because I still can’t, after a couple years, decide how to do that), so instead I went to the garage and…

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Circumnavigating Massachusetts

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Circumnavigating Massachusetts

During my New England trip, I had a weekend where I drove completely around the state of Massachusetts. I’ll call it circumnavigation though I think that only applies to boats. We were shooting photos in Harrisville, NH on Friday and I stayed in a hotel on the border of MA that night. From there I headed south of Boston for some time with Sarah Resnick who owns GIST Yarn and Claudia Chase (owner of Mirrix Looms) who made the long drive from her home in New Hampshire.