Sprang springing up.

I also mentioned... sprang, right? There has been some spranging going on, both in preparation for the workshop I'll give (where there will be a little flower made as a pattern)...

[caption id="attachment_4223" align="alignnone" width="640"] The flower motif - almost invisible on the collapsed sprang...


[caption id="attachment_4222" align="alignnone" width="640"] ...but very much visible when it is stretched out a bit!


...and, as a sideline collateral, some spranging on a project of mine that has been in hibernation for several years. (I believe things like that happen to all of us.) It is basically a very simple thing - a circular (and thus "endless" warp), worked in simple, boring, basic interlinking... to the point where about as much is left over as would make a good bag handle.

The plan, you see, was to make this a bag, which would stretch to almost any form and size, within the (generous) limits that sprang fabric gives. I wanted a nice, long strap as a handle or carrier strap, though, and that is supposed to be a bit slimmer than the rest. The first thing I tried was just taking double threads as working elements, but that did not give enough of a slimming effect, and using 4 or 6 as single elements messes up the nice colour effect. So... double-layered sprang to the rescue!

I did a little test piece in green and purple, to make it easier for me to figure out how things are done...

[caption id="attachment_4224" align="alignnone" width="640"] Thanks to this twisting up on itself, you can see the striped beginning (purple and green following each other) and then, in the middle, the double-layer sprang (where I even did a tiny bit of colour changing).


...and then I started double-layering my strap.



You can see how it narrows down, and changes a bit in structure, but the colours stay similar. It's a little fiddlier than regular sprang, and I am still in the stages where I brain-mumble the mantra of "front layer, back layer, front layer, back layer" all the time (plus I already made one small mistake near one edge), but it does work quite nicely.

Now all that's left to do is a generous amount of double-layer spranging, and then, in the very end, doing double-layer sprang with knitting needles instead of fingers (which will be... exciting!) and finishing it up by securing the final shed (which I will do by weaving in a few threads, to have a firm, stable ending).

And then, eventually, I might have a bag...