twenty-two-hands @twentytwohands-blog - Tumblr Blog

"We don't accomplish anything in this life alone...and whatever happens is the result of the whole tapestry of one's life and all the weavings of individual threads from one to another that creates something."

Sandra Day O'Connor

#Twenty-Two-Hands #quote

Spanish Word of the Week

Leather ~ Cuero

#spanish #word #weekly #leather #cuero #vocabulary #Twenty-Two-Hands

#Twenty-Two-Hands #hands

Hands that thread the loom...

Last time, we talked about how much work goes into preparing the yarn. Well, now that we know how it gets ready, let's learn what happens to it.

The process of threading the loom and getting ready to weave can easily take one day, depending on the weaving style and design. Here's how it happens:

1. A señora hammers several wooden stakes into the ground. The distance between the 2 end stakes is the desired length of the textile plus an extra length to account for loss of length during weaving. The third stake is placed close to one endpoint.

2. She ties 2 strings of yarn to one end stake and begins wrapping the strings around the 3 stakes in a figure eight loop. With each loop she makes, she passes a new pair of strings through the start point, weaving the threads together along the end stake.

3. When she finishes looping, she takes the stakes out of the ground and turns them sideways so the yarn is facing the ground. Then, she ties the threads onto a new wooden rod to secure them.

4. She takes a small, wooden rod with nylon string knotted around one end, and begins to tie the nylon string around each of the warp threads. The nylon string forms the hillaguas (heddles) that separate the warp threads for the passage of the weft. Tying the hillaguas takes time, as there can easily be 100 pairs of warp threads to tie.

5. Once the hillaguas are in place, she carefully spaces the warp threads so they're evenly distributed, not too close together and not too far apart.

Finally, the loom is threaded! This process is extensive because every detail is carefully checked - color, spacing, length, etc. - to make sure that the yarn is correct before fabric is woven.

Next week, we will discuss the hands that weave!

#Twenty-Two-Hands #weave #hillagua #loom #thread #hands

Spanish Word of the Week

To weave ~ Tejer

#spanish #word #weekly #weave #tejar #vocabulary #Twenty-Two-Hands

We've told you how the weaving process works...now let's show you!

#Twenty-Two-Hands #video #weaving #loom #yarn

I think my sense of color I have got from my upbringing in Peru.

Mario Testino

#Twenty-Two-Hands #quote

Spanish Word of the Week

Loom ~ El telar

#spanish #word #weekly #loom #telar #vocabulary #Twenty-Two-Hands

Peru, Peru. My heart's lighthouse.

Steven Patrick Morrissey

#Twenty-Two-Hands #quote

Spanish Word of the Week

Hands ~ Las manos

#spanish #word #weekly #hands #manos #vocabulary #Twenty-Two-Hands

Hands that prepare the yarn...

Have you ever thought about preparing yarn before you start a craft project? Well, at Twenty-Two-Hands, it's a little more complicated than just running to the store to buy materials. All of our products are hand-crafted, and that starts at making the yarn. (We leave making the wool to the sheep.)

To show you the hard work that goes into your uniquely designed product, we want to show just exactly what it takes to prepare yarn.

1. Women who live in the countryside spin wool into a boule, or ball of yarn. It can take 30 days to spin a kilo of yarn.

2. The weaving cooperative buys these boules and unwinds them so they can wash the yarn and prepare it for dyeing and weaving. Unwinding a boule to make a madeja (skein), a woman wraps the yarn around a table or chair to make a loose coil, which is then washed and dried.

3. Señoras place the washed madejas in alumbre (crystallized metal sulfate) so that the yarn will maintain its radiant color in a dye bath.

4. The weaving cooperative prepares natural tints in baths to dye the madejas a full range of colors, adding leaves or botanicals to a large pot of water, and bringing them to a boil over an open fire.

5. Madejas are placed into the color baths and boiled before being hung on a clothes line to dry.

6. The dry madeja gets a final rinse until the rinse water runs clear, and then is again set out to dry.

7. The freshly-dyed and dried madeja is unwound and re-bouled to form a new ball of colored yarn.

That's right. It takes many steps and about 3 days just to get the yarn ready to weave! Stay tuned for next week to learn about hands that thread the loom!

#Twenty-Two-Hands #yarn #boule #madeja #hands

Some of our hands hard at work.

#Twenty-Two-Hands

How many hands go into Twenty-Two-Hands?

Our hands....

-shear sheep

-spin yarn

-gather plants

-create natural dyes

-prepare yarn skeins

-boule yarn

-thread looms

-weave

-design

-develop

-tailor

-sew

-work with leather

-package

-deliver

Our hands work hard to put these designs into yours.

This process is so much bigger than just us. YOU are the ones that use the product and can tell our story.

#Twenty-Two-Hands

Twenty-Two-Hands connects women weavers in Peru to a market for their naturally dyed textiles while connecting YOU to handcrafted textile goods.

#instagram #Twenty-Two-Hands

Spanish Word of the Week

To spin (yarn)- Torcer

#word #weekly #spin #torcer #vocabulary

Spanish Word of the Week

Mountain ~ La montaña

#Spanish #word #weekly #mountain #montaña #vocabulary

Meet Us!

Our Mission

Twenty-Two-Hands is a collaborative artistic endeavor with a purpose to connect women weavers in Peru to a market for their Re-fashioned & Re-imagined, naturally dyed textiles -- and to connect YOU to fine, handcrafted, unique and natural textile products, which tell the story of the process of making them.

#Peru #Textiles #Weaving #Twenty-Two-Hands #Women #Spanish #Purses #Bags #Homemade

Trending Blogs

Recently Viewed Blogs

twenty-two-hands