A Wedding Commission

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A young woman named Collette emailed me last spring about possibly weaving bridesmaids shawls for her September wedding,   I really enjoyed weaving shawls for my son's bride and their bridesmaids a few years ago , so I was definitely interested.  Collette and I talked and planned over the next couple  of months to make sure the shawls would be just what she had in mind.

First, Collette sent me a picture of the flowers she was that going to use and a picture of the fabric in the bridesmaids' gowns.   She wanted to pick up the colors in the flowers and, initially, thought she wanted to use some form of cream, blue, teal, and a deep red.

​I pulled some Tencel off my shelf and mailed her several yarn wraps to give her some ideas. 

She settled on yarn wrap #2 but wanted to swap the azure for grey blue to better match the dress fabric.

Now to plan the warp.

Yarn wraps

​Collette had seen a shawl in my online shop and decided she like the plaited twill in that shawl.  So all I had to do was work with the colors in Fiberworks to work out the proportions of the colors in  the gradation.  We came to an agreement, and I got busy measuring warps, getting them on loom,  and weaving color samples.

Strickler pattern #360

4 warp chains ready to be wound on

Warp spread in the raddle

Warp wound onto the back beam

Color sampling

Collette decided on the navy blue Tencel weft.  I wove the shawls over the next month.  Lots and lots of fringe! Almost 800 bouts of twisted fringe took a few more days and, finally,  the shawls were ready to be shipped off to her.

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A couple of months before the wedding, Collette reached out to me to have shawls woven for her mother and future mother-in-law.

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​In September, Collette and Kyle were married at a beautiful setting in New Hampshire. 

The bridesmaids and moms wore shawls that I created. 

​The bride was wearing a  gorgeous shawl woven for her by her aunt.

The bride's mother

The bride's mother-in-law

Collette and Kyle. The bride is wearing a shawl created for her by her aunt.