[Ansteorra-textiles] spinning and weaving books

[Robert and Beth Ellis]

As a rather dim (but cute) old boyfriend of mine used to say oh so many years
ago,  "Hey, waaaiitt....".

> I actually feel pretty good - I don't weave as much as I spin or think
> about doing but I went over to help a friend set up her loom last
> night.  She knows nothing besides getting Corrine to give her some
> suggestions on books.  Anyway, I was able to look at the loom and figure
> out the missing parts and what needed to be done to repair the stuff before
> we started working on it.

Who's got the new loom? Do tell! What all was missing/needed repair?

> Corrine is on this list and she does wonderful
> weaving and dying so she may have recommendations for beooks for beginning
> spinners and weavers. (plug).

Huh...don't know about the wonderful part.  I warped up my production inkle
today to do several feet of trim, and the flat gold stuff I bought to do the
brocading with didn't work right at all. I ripped it all out and now have to
develop a Plan B.  Sigh.

As to good weaving books, my favorite for beginning weaving (and for reference
forever after) is Chandler's Learn to Weave.  Great book - I think everybody
should start with that one. The Complete Book of Drafting for Handweavers
(Madelyn van der Hoogt) is good too, but it can get confusing for somebody who
is brand new (or not so brand new) to weaving.  Right now my favorite fleece
preparation book is Fournier and Fournier's In Sheeps Clothing.  I learned a
lot of what F & F discuss the hard way - but it was nice to see it affirmed in
their book. Wish I'd had it to start with.  By the way, that book deals
primarily with fleece identification and preparation methods rather than
spinning techniques.  ID and prep methods are the building blocks of good
spinning, and I have yet to find a spinning technique book that deals
adequately with this issue. As far as spinning technique itself, I haven't
really found a book to rave over - although the technique sections in Paula
Simmons "Spinning and Weaving with Wool" are pretty  decent.  All the other
books I've seen are just too basic - they don't talk much about matching prep
and spinning method to fleece type, and many don't really tell you how to
develop good technique.  One book I haven't seen is the Alden Amos (or is it
Amos Alden?) tome.  Anybody got an opinion on it?

Corrinne