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I have always loved Ephemera. Even pieces of textile or bits of the natural world give me pleasure, either because of a memory they evoke or because I love the perfection of a small piece of the whole. Often our mind’s eye works to form a complete image from a fragment, a process that is strangely satisfying. Often, the fragment contains a powerful design element or feature. I collect so many things. And often they work their way into an art object, sooner or later. I see the value in many objects that are considered garbage to others.

Since Winter 2020, I have been sewing garments and afgans from pieces of handwoven cloth that had been leftovers from larger projects. This cloth was too precious to me to consider discarding! The pieces represented a lot of time involved in the weaving process, and so much time finding the yarns.

I wanted to add vintage crocheted doilies and the bits and pieces of antique and modern laces I had collected over the years to the cotton and silk handwoven cloths. And I also had a lot of sewing “notions” that I had also collected for both the cotton and silk and wool and mohair cloth. Let’s not forget the buttons I have collected.

 

Hard to explain my technique, except to say I have really perfected some things over the years. I use a sewing machine to zig zag some edges. I “full” or “shrink” some pieces to make them more stable. I like to hand sew most things together but machine stitch some joins for some extra strength when necessary. It takes forever to choose what pieces. Colour is probably the most important consideration to me. Then durability. I do enjoy the hand sewing. Over years of doing this, I have learned to make a virtue out of necessity by accenting some joins instead of trying to hide them. Also, I have learned to cut pieces to fit, not always just using the whole piece as it exists. At least one time I have reformed my sewn piece as I just did not like its new shape and the proportions of the pieces. Its all very labour intensive.

I am pleased with the final pieces. They are so One of a Kind. I show them off on my Instagram page, handweavingbyjanet. and my Facebook page, Handweaving by Janet Whittam. These pieces take much longer than just weaving a total garment from one piece would have done. But, its so much fun, Finally I have to STOP and get down to real weaving (to say nothing of basketry! I must get back to that.). Biggest challenge is working on and filling my online shop, now connected to this website under…..Shop! just another project that I must get to. E-Commerce. Always another challenge!

We moved very quickly into our new house 5 years ago now. The people buying our old house were impatient to start work on it. We were impatient to get moved in. The vast space which was to be my studio got some drywall on the walls and white paint and that was that.

My husband said it would be like an “industrial space”, and I thought “Yeah, gritty!” and felt very hip and au courrant and also, younger, less hide bound, more open minded, etc.  Walls covered with shelves of yarn and 6 looms with projects underway were a dynamic and attractive distraction.
Then I saw the pictures online of Jean Sharp’s new studio! Well thought out, beautiful, etc. Maybe that’s when I started feeling my space was, well, shabby with lots of ugly corners. The lighting was amateur.

I hated the duck tape, red industrial tape and even pink insulation peeking out. I noticed I was bringing projects into the rest of the house to work on.

Time for a reno. Packing up all my yarn and basketry stuff and all those shells with holes in them and skate egg cases and driftwood, pine needles, lotus seed pods, felting supplies, etc., was quite a job. John took apart several looms.

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It all took so much time. There also were all the decisions about what really was I going to use and what materials should be eliminated from storage. It was like a sober second thought, as I had certainly pared back supplies and materials when we moved in five years ago.

We used a carpenter/contractor who had done a lot of work on our old house. He has many years experience, and does things that I would never even think of, but which adds immeasurably to the finished project.

He wanted us to choose paint colours, doors, flooring and told us where to shop. I felt very inadequate at this shopping! Could not visualize how anything was going to look.  So far it seems to be looking good. The electrician, plumber, etc,. were people  he has enjoyed working with over the years and they were excellent workers, as well as very agreeable to have coming and going.

The last step of course was moving everything back!  Talk about a make work project. And then I had a series of medical interventions when I discovered I had cancer.  The treatments take so much of a toll, but all is well. Oh yes, and then a knee replacement. I feel very fortunate to have had  such wonderful medical care, and the timing of it all before COVID 19.  But, all in all, its taken over a year and a half to really get my workshop operational.  Just this week I made a last adjustment to a loom’s foot pedals.

I am loving being in my new studio, back to work and rediscovering all my yarns and full of new ideas for projects. The pandemic has insisted I stay at home, and that has been good for weaving. Now, my next challenge. Figuring out ecommerce, to sell my work as the pandemic has certainly not been good for my craft shows.

UPDATE !  With a lot of assistance, I have an online shop on this website, in the Menu under….. SHOP.