For months now I have been drooling over Saori style jackets but don't have a spare £500. Then it occurred to me. I have access to fibres, I can spin, I can weave and I can sew! Why not have a go at making my own?
I decided on a sort of jazzed up country tweed look predominately brown because I have brown boots. I also have a brown alpaca fleece, a brown soay fleece and lots of bits and bobs of other colours from my felting. When I'm felting I often have odd bits of fibre left over that I put in a tub meaning to use later but I can never find the colour I want and end up throwing them away when the tub gets full so I decided to use some of those for the tweedy bits.
I gathered everything together along with my drum carder.
In order to make the yarn mostly brown I decided to make a sort of sandwich. I carded my brown fibres together and laid them on the table then selected my tweedy colours. I decided to use colours that are in brown like reds and oranges and rusts but then decided to throw in some purple and pink for good measure (they both contain red after all) . Then thought I would need a contrast colour so added some green!
Yum! I also added some silk fibres which I have in my stash. They were pale green and pink. I then carded more brown fibres and put them on top of the colours to complete the sandwich.
And here is the yarn after plying,
washing and setting the twist.
I'm really happy with it and can't wait to see how it looks when woven. Of course, I have a lot more spinning to do before there is enough for a jacket and I will probably spin some other yarns which contain the same colours but in different quantities so I have variations.
I decided on a sort of jazzed up country tweed look predominately brown because I have brown boots. I also have a brown alpaca fleece, a brown soay fleece and lots of bits and bobs of other colours from my felting. When I'm felting I often have odd bits of fibre left over that I put in a tub meaning to use later but I can never find the colour I want and end up throwing them away when the tub gets full so I decided to use some of those for the tweedy bits.
I gathered everything together along with my drum carder.
In order to make the yarn mostly brown I decided to make a sort of sandwich. I carded my brown fibres together and laid them on the table then selected my tweedy colours. I decided to use colours that are in brown like reds and oranges and rusts but then decided to throw in some purple and pink for good measure (they both contain red after all) . Then thought I would need a contrast colour so added some green!
These were all randomly carded together in to a batt and placed on top of the brown.
Yum! I also added some silk fibres which I have in my stash. They were pale green and pink. I then carded more brown fibres and put them on top of the colours to complete the sandwich.
Each sandwich was then run through the carder again to blend the colours slightly. I had about 9 so ended up with arm ache but it was worth it.
I split each batt a few times length ways to make them manageable and sorted them in to two piles because I wanted to spin a plied yarn and needed to make two equal length of singles. I then spun them just as they came.
The light was not good for photos but I've done my best to show you the finished yarn. In reality the colours were much richer. They look a bit washed out in the photos but you can see the tweed. Here they are still on the bobbins.
And here is the yarn after plying,
I'm really happy with it and can't wait to see how it looks when woven. Of course, I have a lot more spinning to do before there is enough for a jacket and I will probably spin some other yarns which contain the same colours but in different quantities so I have variations.
If you want to try this but don't have a drum carder you could achieve the same result with a mixing board or even hand carders.
I will keep you updated on this project and show you the cloth I weave with this yarn next time.
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