My Way of Starting a Tapestry

I thought it would be fun to document how I worked through the development of this tapestry. I posted the original photos that I took in the spring at the Bozeman Creek Trail earlier and from them I did several drawings. In this final drawing, I changed everything so that the design would be weavable and the drawing was simplified so I could follow it as a cartoon.



The size of the drawing and the amount of detail that it had, made me think that it would be better woven larger than the 9"x12" size of my sketchbook so I wanted to double the size of my cartoon and see if that looked about right to me. I know I could have taken it to a copy shop and had it done there but I like enlarging with a grid and I can also correct any problems that come from enlarging right on the spot. I just feel like I have more control this way. I used some waterproof ink on a plastic page protector to make a one inch grid that I could lay over my drawing. In this case I didn't want to draw the grid directly on the drawing in case I wanted to do a different rate of enlargement.



On a larger piece of paper, I drew out a grid with two inch squares and then drew in the design from the smaller grid to the larger one following the squares. This upsizing seemed just right for me to weave in the detail that I wanted without having to change my usual sett of 8 epi so I was very happy with it and now I had my cartoon.



After warping my Mirrix loom with some Davidson's Old Mill wool warp, I selected the colors I needed. I had mostly everything I wanted but had to spin some sky blues and the deep gold/tans for the path. I probably won't use all these colors but it is often hard to predict what I will need until I am weaving. I don't color in my cartoon or have too much of a color plan ahead of time because I like to do that while I'm weaving. It just makes it more interesting to me to not have all the details planned ahead of time.



These yarns are all handspun and are several natural and dyed colors blended on the drumcarder before spinning which might be a little difficult to see in the photo.




So far I have a little more than 4" of 22" woven. Maybe as there is a little more weaving done, the colors will photograph better but you can get the idea from this.