Have you ever had a piece turn out feeling blah and boring – but you didn’t know how to fix it?
This article explains how to use color contrast to spice up your handwoven cloth.
Why handwoven cloth transforms at a distance: Pattern scale and optical mixing
One of the curious things about handwoven cloth, particularly painted warps or cloth with large stripes of color, is that it can transform dramatically at a distance. Close up, the beautiful woven pattern, the pattern in your draft, is visible. But from a distance, the woven pattern almost disappears, leaving only the larger pattern of the color stripes or the painted warp.
What’s the mystery? How does this happen?
Let’s find out.
The Warp & Weave weaving color mixing tool is now available!
The Warp & Weave weaving color mixing tool allows you to simulate the cloth that results from mixing two colors in warp and weft. You can pick colors manually or from an uploaded image – or simply snap a photo with your smartphone or tablet! – and instantly see how the colors will weave up in four common weave structures (plain weave, 1/3, 2/2, and 3/1 twill). You can see the results in fine, medium, or thick threads.
Choosing wefts to showcase the colors in your painted warp
Struggling to figure out weft colors for a painted warp? Here’s one way to preserve your painted warp colors: Choose a weft color that is less saturated than the colors in your painted warp.
Understanding color mixing in weaving: Warp, weft, and the role of the draft
Weaving is like painting in some ways. Your warp and weft colors are like tubes of paint, giving you basic colors to start with. Your draft is like your palette and brush, where you take your original paint colors, mix them into new colors, and then place them in your fabric.
Often, when we think about color in weaving, we think only about the colors of the yarns we choose. But this is like thinking only about the colors in your paint tubes. We also need to think about how the drafts will mix the colors.
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