| ==================== Rugs With Ruffled Edges ==================== § > ... I ended up with a rug with ruffled > edges, if that makes any sense. The selvage is very > even but there are hills and valleys on the outside > edges, but not the center... is there something else I need to attend > to next time? > Thanks, Annette This often happens with a rug but when it has been walked on a bit, it may flatten out. The difference comes in how you bubble the weft. To explain how this happens, think about two rugs woven in two different ways. The first one is woven with the weft placed straight across the warp with no bubbling. The warp will need to bend over and under the weft. This rug is then woven as a warp faced rug. For a 60 inch rug, you will probably need 75" of warp just to make the 60 inches of the rug. The warp is undulating and there is a lot of take up in a warp faced rug. Now think of another rug where the weft is bubbled a lot and the warp is then able to be straight. This is a weft faced rug. To weave the 60 inch rug you would need a warp 60 inches of warp (maybe a fraction more in reality) because the warp is straight in the rug. Now suppose you are weaving a rug where you want some bubbling. So, you angle the weft up and then down to the other selvage. You are careful to make a perfect triangle with a point in the middle. You hold your finger on the point as you change the shed. So, the bubbling is the same everywhere. If you watch the weavers in Mexico make their tapesty woven rugs and blankets, this is the way they make the bubbling. This can work very well, but you need to be very careful when you form the triangle. Now suppose you are weaving a rug and you are bubbling the weft the same way, but you let go of the center and the line of the bubbling is more like a flat topped hill rather than a pointed mountain. So, at the top of the hill, the weft is actually flat and the weft is angled at the sides. So, in the center of the rug you are weaving much like a warp faced rug, with the flat weft in the center forcing the warp to bend over and under the weft. This part of the rug will need more warp length than the sides of the rug, which are being bubbled more like a weft faced rug. The sides of the rug will not take so much of the warp and will not have as much take up in the warp as the center. So, now you have a rug that is shorter in the center and longer at the sides, or as you say, has ruffled edges. It is better to bubble the weft very carefully, making several smaller hills and valleys. And the tops of the hills and the bottoms of the valleys should be very small and vary from one weft to the next, so that there are no areas where you are consistently leaving the weft horizontal. Joanne Hall --------------- |
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| (To explain how this happens, think about two rugs woven in two different ways.) |
