viking tunic

 I have finished the Viking tunic. In the end I decided to machine sew the tunic as I was worried the edges would fray and eventually unravel. As it was all very dark in colour I decided it needed some colour to brighten it up by way of a tablet woven band. I read up on the traditional Viking designs and set off to make a band, but as a novice tablet weaver I found the number of cards used and the pattern too hard and I could not create the correct tension on the band so I un warped the tablets and started again with a less ambitious pattern. This worked out much better. I had hoped to use the band to fully cover the raw edges of the tunic but found I was not able to weave a band that wide so I had to just put the band on the outside, therefore not hiding the messy seam edge on the inside of the tunic.

I was very happy in the finished piece and it has been worn out to an SCA event and kept my son very warm, it may be a little too warm for summer though.

Redlands visit

 I went for a trip to visit Redlands with my parents and the boys. My Dad had been there before on a painting trip so we thought we would go back and see what inspiration we could find amongst the old buildings. Redlands is an old estate dating from the 1820s. In its hay day it had 200 workers and their families living on the estate. Today its a distillery that grows its own barley.

 This is the old Oast house where the hops were once dried. I was standing in the secret garden at the time, this garden was the one place the owners of the estate could be alone from all those workers.

 This row of houses used to house convict labour, we are talking before Port Arthur was built.

 A fragment of window netting made from wool.

 And what is up these stairs?

 The upstairs room. I was very disappointed not to have found a ghost in the photo as the room was pitch black.

 I loved this piece of wallpaper edging in one of the convict homes, later used by workers. It looked had painted and very out of place in such a rustic setting but I guess the owner of this house once had a very fashionable décor.

And to the end of our trip.

sculpture trail

It is that time of the year again and I headed down the channel with the boys to have a look at the sculpture trail at Birches Bay and then have lunch at the Pepperberries café. here is just a highlight of some of the art works we saw.

life in the garden

I try to find the flowers and new growth in the garden to remind me that even though the wildlife eat most things there are a few plants that continue to grow in my garden and attract other animals.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

eyelet button hole

I have been learning how to make an eyelet button hole to go on the sewn armour I made for my son to use while he does rapier . I wanted to keep the jacket fairly authentic, even though sewing is not what I am good at . The jacket will have ties to fasten it, not buttons. This first hole was too small to let the cord through so I made larger ones and they seem to be working well, so far.

five finger loop weaving

What to do on a quiet weekend. WEll at our house we learn how to do the five loop viking finger  weaving. Now that I am working on the Viking tunic for my son to wear at the  medieval society he thought he would like a belt for it so we had a go at finger braiding. This is similar to other braiding I have done except that you keep a loop at the end of the yarn and use you finger to pull threads through these loops to create the braid. We started off by using my hand spun but I think it was a little hard to separate and keep then tension tight. We later tried commercial yarn and this was a lot easier to use, but not authentic for the viking period of course. It was lots of fun and I want to try some more.

 

 

 

 

 

Viking tunic

 

It is always the best feeling when you finally get to cut your weaving off.

It feels like the weaving of this Viking tunic took forever but I think that is only because the research into creating an authentic replica tunic form the viking era took such a long time and then of course the winding on and threading up of the 5 metre warp did take a while to do. BUT here we are all done and even with a nice grey band running down it. Next is the cutting out and then the sewing up. I  have been researching the traditional seams from this period but I am a little nervous about the material fraying at the edges if the seam is not done well enough.