Cally Booker | Handweaver

25 Feb 2020

Are we there yet?

Yes, we are!

It took us a couple of weeks of snatched hours and half-hours, but the Toika Eeva is now assembled. On Thursday I put on a test warp, but other than as ‘proof of concept’ have hardly had time to weave it.

As I needed S to help with all the heavy lifting, we mainly worked in the evenings. The light in the room is legendarily bad at night (something we have had on our list to sort out for the last twenty years, so don’t hold your breath), my WIP photos are unintelligible. However, I can clearly demonstrate our progress:

Eeva occupies the spot vacated by the Delta (plus quite a bit) so I still have a loom-with-a-view, but also a loom-with-cables, which is an entirely new experience for me. I’m re-learning my relationship to Fiberworks, as well as to the loom. I’ll let you know how it goes…

“Are we there yet?” was posted by Cally on 25 Feb 2020 at https://callybooker.co.uk

8 Feb 2020

New Arrival

Yesterday a crate arrived from Finland. Absolutely no prizes on offer here. If you can’t guess what was inside, you are probably lost on the interwebs.

Crate from Finland

The same footprint as our car!

Under the lid

One layer down

Last layer

The current situation

The driver had quite a task to get it off the truck as it was an extremely snug fit. Yes, this made me very nervous. But he was ingenious and capable and all turned out well. ‘Parked’ in front of our car, the crate was about the same length and width.

Luckily for me, S had already been planning to work from home on Friday, and was sanguine (he is always sanguine!) about devoting his lunchtime to manual labour. It took us two stages – road to patio, patio to house – and about an hour and a quarter to carry everything indoors and get the crate out of the public highway.

So now you know it is a loom from Finland. You want to know which one, don’t you? Can I tease you a bit longer, or can you tell from the pictures? It is actually written on one of the boxes, but you’ll have to zoom in.

No, I’m not spending the weekend putting it together, because there’s a wee hitch. Since the Delta went off to its new life a couple of weeks ago, S thought he would seize the chance to revarnish the floor. But the Toika was a bit speedier to arrive than we anticipated! So this is the varnish-enough-floor-to-stand-a-loom-on weekend, and assembly is on pause for a few days. Naturally, I will keep you posted…

“New Arrival” was posted by Cally on 8 Feb 2020 at https://callybooker.co.uk

17 Dec 2019

Loom for sale

UPDATE: The loom is now sold. Thanks to everyone for spreading the word! Delta is looking forward to the next stage in its weaving adventures.

The time has come to sell my lovely Louet Delta countermarche loom. I am sad to part with it, but need to make space for – guess what – another loom. I have added a lot of extras to the basic loom, so the complete package now consists of:

Key features:

8 shafts
14 treadles
130 cm (approx. 51 inches) weaving width
Built-in raddle
Sectional warp beam
Second warp and back beam
Fly shuttle attachment

Price also includes:

Louet loom bench
10 dpi reed
Lease sticks
Fly shuttle and pirns
Approx. 200 heddles per shaft

The overall dimensions are approximately:

160 cm wide (230 cm with fly shuttle attachment)
100 cm deep (115 cm with second back beam in place)
128 cm high

It could be expanded to 12 shafts with an extension kit available from a Louet dealer.

I’m asking £2,500 for the whole lot and the buyer will need to collect from Dundee. Hey, you can visit the V&A while you’re here! If you are interested, drop me a line.

These photos were taken a few weeks ago in my rather crowded room: it is difficult to step back and get it all in… They are a mix of portrait and landscape, so click the wee squares to see the full glory.

27 Oct 2019

Shift Canada Residency

I’ve seldom been so glad of the extra hour’s sleep, courtesy of the clock change, as I was last night. Yesterday I got home after a short but very intense residency at NSCAD in Halifax, Nova Scotia. It was a whirlwind of mental, physical and social activity over ten days, and will take me a while to process.

Four makers travelled from Scotland to Canada, where we were paired with four Nova Scotian makers for a collaborative exchange. My partner is Andrea Tsang Jackson, a contemporary quilt artist, and we spent much of the week getting to know each other’s work and interests. The themes of the exchange are identity, sustainability and collaboration, so there is a lot to explore. We talked about our home cities and their changing landscapes; about our own backgrounds and sense of belonging; about materials and resources; about the role of textiles in shaping and expressing identity; and much, much more. It was exciting and energising and I am looking forward to seeing where we end up.

Our Scottish foursome were very warmly welcomed in Halifax. We hadn’t known each other before we travelled, but sharing a rented house together on Halifax Common soon took care of that. Applied Arts Scotland provided the funding which enabled us to travel; NSCAD provided us with studio space and materials; and our partners generously took us out and about in the city and the region – so we had nothing to wish for except more time!

Around Halifax

Studio time

Field Trip to Taproot Fibre Lab

The next few months will see us developing our collaborative work, with a return visit planned for the spring and an exhibition next summer. I’ll keep you posted…

“Shift Canada Residency” was posted by Cally on 27 October 2019 at https://callybooker.co.uk

4 Oct 2019

Weaver, Interrupted

September turned out to be a very odd month. We had more major ‘life events’ in a three-week period than we normally deal with in as many years, and only one was really intentional: building work right in the middle of our house. So while the builders got on with that, we bounced in and out of our own lives in a most disorienting way. But now all the Bookers, human and cat, are back at home and mighty glad to be so.

The chief logistical problem now is one of furniture. The layout of our home means that ‘the middle’ is very much at the centre of our living as well as the building. Every room is accessed through one large central space. To enable the builders to do their thing we had to empty this central space and move all our stuff to the margins. However, thanks to one of our other ‘events’, I am now minus my appendix (and plus a lot of stitches in my own central space), so I am barred from heavy lifting for a while and can’t move it back! My brother has been helping S to shift the heaviest and most in-the-way items, which makes a big difference. But there is a lot of work still to do which requires decision-making, and we haven’t had the mental capacity for that.

Meanwhile, I have also had to take a short break from weaving, which brings its own frustrations. I had woven roughly half a scarf warp and cut those pieces off the loom, but the second half of the warp still awaits me, with the first scarf half-woven. It feels as though ‘half-done’ is a strong theme just now…

As I have recovered my energy levels, though, there has been plenty to keep me entertained.

I’ve been working away on my Bonny Claith website, to get the online shop back up and running. Its launch won’t be quite as soon as I had hoped, but that is partly because I am going to be travelling in October for a new project I am very excited about! I didn’t want to open up the shop just to close it again straight away.
I’ve also been busy behind the scenes of the Complex Weavers website, putting up all the information about next year’s CW Seminars and getting a taste of the topics which will be presented there.
Those scarves I cut off needed finishing (and they still need labelling)
I’ve got a new ‘Weave’ banner for my studio underway on a table loom
There’s a new Weaving Space workshop coming up which needs some preparation, and I’ve re-started my series on double weave at Warp Space
A few braiding experiments snuck into the mix

There’s probably more I could add to that list, but I must say just seeing those few items make me feel that I am getting back on track. I’ve been enormously cheered this week to have a flying visit from fellow-Complex Weaver Amy Norris and friends. Online friendships are great, but it’s even better when you can get together in person! And there is lots more to look forward to as well: new projects, new events, new ideas.