March 2024 Program

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Beyond Knitting and Crochet: Other Fiber Arts That Won’t Break the Bank

with Chris Sterling

Tuesday 3/26/24, 7 pm at the Congregational Church in Harvard MA

Chris Sterling’s many ideas for affordable equipment


At this in-person only meeting, Chris will share with the guild her collection of fiber arts related tools most of which can be purchased for under one hundred dollars – sometimes a little bit more, and in some cases a whole lot less. She will start with creating yarn with a drop spindle rather than a spinning wheel, and will move on to creating cords with a lucet, a knitting spool and a kumihimo disk. Tools to create bands include tablets, or cards, inkle looms and bead looms. Stand-alone squares and other shapes can be made by pin looms, turtle looms and pot holder looms. She will include several variations of rigid heddle looms, tapestry looms, and peg looms for larger projects. For non-woven projects there will be a short discussion of wet and needle felting. Should she discover any more neat tools, she will bring them along. Time will be provided at the end for guild members to get a closer look at her collection.

Chris is attempting to create a presentation aimed at non-weavers, which would be a low cost introduction to the weaver’s world. She realizes that many of the guild members know more than she does about some if not all of these tools, and would appreciate feedback.

Chris Sterling
Chris wove her first scarf in 1970 while on a Junior year abroad program in Sweden, the native land of all her grandparents, but it was not until 1978 that she learned how to dress the loom when she took a weaving course and bought her first loom while living outside of Ottawa, Ontario Canada. While in Canada she was a member of the Ottawa Valley Weavers Guild. She moved to Bolton MA in 1987 and discovered that the newly formed Nashoba Valley Weavers Guild was just up the road in Harvard. She considers herself an “almost charter member” having joined the guild in its first year. There were several gaps where she did not attend meetings or pay dues, but she is now very happy to be back in the flock. In addition to weaving, she enjoys beading, paper crafts, and eco-dying silk scarves.

February 2024 Meeting with Laura Fry

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Tuesday 27 February, 7 p.m. on Zoom

Laura Fry presents “The Goldilocks Zone”

The issue of tension rises in many stages in the weaving process. Laura will talk about what “good tension” is and ways to determine if the process might be made better by adjusting how much tension one uses. A thread under tension is a thread under control, but it has to be the ‘right’ amount of tension – the Goldilocks Zone.

Laura Fry’s business focus has evolved with the changing economy and market trends from a concentration on table textiles to weaving yardage on contract for a fashion designer. In addition, Laura teaches throughout Canada and the United States, writes for a variety of textile publications, and wins awards for the beautiful clothing fabrics that have always been her passion. After years of work and study, Laura earned certification in 1997 as one of Canada’s Master Weavers, the 27th weaver to achieve the honor. Read Laura’s full bio on her website.

A Zoom link will be sent to members the week before the meeting. If you would like to join the meeting as a guest, please email us.

Winter/Spring 2024 Programs

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Save the dates!

2/27 – Laura Fry, “The Goldilocks Zone” on Zoom

3/26 – Chris Sterling, “Beyond Knitting and Crotchet; other fiber arts that won’t break the bank”, in person in Harvard

4/23 – Arlette Stawasz, Chair Caning, in person in Harvard

5/28 – Bobbin Lace, presenter TBD, in person in Harvard

6/25 –  Potluck, annual meeting, elections, Guild member swap/sale, in person, location TBA

January 2024 Guild Meeting

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Christine Miller – Wire as Fiber, A Fiber Artist’s Tale

Tuesday 23 January, 7pm on Zoom

Wire as fiber is a presentation about Christine’s journey as a weaver of 50 years, her discovery of wire as fiber, and an overview of her work with wire
over 30 years as an artist, teacher & author. As a retired visual arts educator, she uses the lens of the 8 Studio Habits of Art to reflect on her artistic
journey and shares these artistic concepts with her audience.

Christine is a life long fiber artist and has been exploring fiber through many processes and techniques. She has been weaving by hand for over 50 years, and for the last 30 years she has been weaving with wire as warp and weft to create a woven metal fabric that can be used for sculptural expressions. In addition to weaving she has experience in sewing, basketry, embroidery, felting, dyeing, knitting, crochet, and fiber sculpture. Her sculptural expressions are created from a woven metal fabric that she weaves by hand on an eight shaft floor loom from wire and fiber. After the woven metal fabric is created, she sculpts, shapes, and stitches the forms together by hand with wire. Individual units are assembled into larger sculptural forms which are also stitched together by hand with wire. Wall hangings are created from layers of the woven metal fabric. Sculptures and wall hangings are embellished with other fibers, beads, or objects, hand dyed felt, found objects, and crocheted wire. Her sculptures and bas-relief wall hangings display both the strength of the material, but also the flexibility of creating undulating lines.

She teaches online classes about weaving with wire, and just published a book with Schiffer Publishing, Weaving with Wire: Creating Woven Metal Fabric. She is a former visual arts educator with local and national arts education recognition. Christine continues bringing fiber arts into the educational world with Visiting Artist programs and workshops, and conducting professional development sessions for school districts across the state.

A Zoom link will be sent to members prior to the event. If you are interested in visiting the Guild for the program, please email us for the link. Agenda for the evening:

  • 7:00 – Zoom opens for socializing
  • 7:30 – Brief business meeting and announcements
  • ~7:45 – Program with Christine Miller begins

For more information on Christine, visit her website.

December 2023 Guild Meeting – Visible Mending

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France has launched an initiative to combat clothing waste, subsidizing the repair of shoes and clothes on the verge of becoming unusable instead of throwing them away. Are you ready to follow suit? A so-called “darning loom” is the latest gadget in the fiber community, enabling clever consumers to repair their own clothing with “visible mending”. This inexpensive device holds your knit or woven fabric under tension and provides an anchor for warp threads while you weave a patch. The downside to the ingenious little loom is the lack of instructions in the package when you purchase them. Here’s your opportunity to learn how to use it to weave a patch that is functional – repairing a real hole – or just decorative.

Our Nov/Dec meeting will be held on Tuesday 5 December, starting at 1pm at the Congregational Church in Harvard. The program is a hands-on activity to learn to mend or darn holes in fabrics using the trendy “Speedweve” looms. If you do not have a little loom and did not pre-order one, they can be purchased online. This is the one we are purchasing for the group order, but you can get any variation or size that you prefer. Those who do not wish to participate in the mending are welcome to come just to see what’s happening and enjoy an afternoon together!

What’s happening at the meeting?

  • 1:00 Social time and library browsing
  • 1:30 Announcements and Show & Tell
  • 2:00 Begin the mending! The activity will be led by the Weavers’ Study Group that meets on Tuesdays at The Fiber Loft.
  • 4:00 Be done and cleaned up

What to bring:

  • A couple articles of woven or knit clothing in need of small (not larger than 1” square) mending. Examples of items might be jeans, sweaters or jackets, but other items can also be repaired. For practice, a plain scrap of fabric can also be used.
  • Bits of smooth yarn – commercial or handspun – to create decorative patches. Embroidery floss, or 5/2 or 10/2 mercerized cotton works well, but feel free to be creative!
  • Tapestry needle (one also comes with the loom)
  • Scissors
  • Glasses or magnifiers
  • $5 co-pay if you pre-ordered a loom
  • Or bring your own loom

22Oct Open House at Faulkner House, and an Honor for NVWG

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Earlier this month, the kind folks at Iron Work Farm (of which Faulkner House is a part) bestowed honors upon our Guild, naming us the 2023 Volunteers of the Year!  We all have so much fun doing our demos there that it seems a little sinful to be acknowledged for it.  I guess that proves that community outreach can be rewarding on many, many levels!  We are very grateful that Iron Work Farm and the Faulkner House are so appreciative of our playtime!

Care to join us?  The final Open House of the year will be held this Sunday (22Oct) from 3-5pm.  The address is 5 High St, Acton MA.  NVWG members are invited to weave, spin, knit, or do any other type of fiber art demo…or just come to check things out!  It’s a very cool early 1700’s house with a rich history.  Contact Laura (laura@northbrookalpacas.com) for more details.

October 2023 Guild Meeting

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Finished samples from all the looms!

The October meeting for the Nashoba Valley Weavers’ Guild is Tuesday 10/24 at the Congregational Church in Harvard, 2 Still River Rd.

Our main meeting will be a member participation show & tell. Everyone will have the opportunity to share about the class(es) they took at NEWS or what they wove over the summer. We’ll also get a recap of the lace workshop that went on last week and will get to see the samples that were generated from that. Please bring things you made at NEWS or over the summer!

Agenda for the evening:
6:00 Board meeting
7:00 Social time
7:30 Start of business meeting – announcements and then show & tell

Also, if you have not yet paid your dues for this year, they are due to the Treasurer by this meeting. After that, unpaid people will be dropped from the membership list and google group. You may also mail your dues to PO Box 50, Harvard MA 01451.

September 2023 Guild meeting and program

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Weaving Air: A Brief Overview of Lace Weaves
Laurie Autio

Lace weaves magically allow the weaver to bend the grid, creating holes to allow air and light to become part of their design. These weaves have been called plain weave with defects (Diana Frost), with floats added in one or both directions to pattern the cloth. This introductory lecture covers five loom-controlled lace weaves:  Huck, Canvas, Swedish Lace, Lace Bronson, and Spot Bronson. We’ll look at how each structure works, plus setts, materials, and weaving tips. There will be a wide variety of samples and pieces to examine.

Laurie Autio began weaving in 1985 and enjoys all parts of weaving, particularly figuring out how design and structure work and can be pushed. Music, crystallography, nature, and study of Japanese textiles influence her design work and lace weaves are a passion. Her weaving education includes a Master Weaver Certificate from Hill Institute (2000), serving as Coordinator of Study Groups for Complex Weavers (1998-2001), and a large library. Laurie began teaching around 1993 for various guilds, NEWS, Convergence, and Complex Weavers. In recent years she has run a four-year class called Explorations in Advanced Weaving and is slowly learning about Jacquard weaving. Laurie has served as President of Complex Weavers, Dean of Weavers Guild of Boston, President of Weavers of Western Mass., and Chair of Pioneer Valley Weavers. She enjoys writing, was co-editor of Interlaced (Weavers Guild of Boston, 2012) and editor of Eight Shafts: Beyond the Beginning, Personal Approaches to Design (Complex Weavers, 2022).

Where: Congregational Church of Harvard, 5 Still River Rd., Harvard, MA
When: Tuesday 26 September, 7 p.m.

The meeting starts with socializing, snacks, and browsing the library. The formal meeting and presentation begin at 7:30. This presentation will be educational for all Guild members, whether participating in the October Lace Workshop or not.

 

Fall 2023 Programs Announced!

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All programs this fall will be at the Congregational Church in Harvard, MA. We start with snacks, socializing and library time. Details will be posted soon!

26 September, 7 pm (meeting and presentation at 7:30) – Introduction to Lace Weaves with Laurie Autio

24 October, 7 pm (meeting and presentation at 7:30) – Show & Tell and NEWS Recap – Bring your summer creations and samples from your NEWS classes.

Tues 5 December starting at 1 pm – Little Darning Looms hands-on workshop