Weaving as a way to expand creativity

"You can't do sketches enough. Sketch everything and keep your curiosity fresh." John Singer Sargent

What I do more than make hats & sew is work in my sketchbook. I have sketchbooks that go back to when I was eight years old. Some of them take years to fill, others were quickly finished during dull office jobs. They line the shelves of my library each one looking uniquely different from the other.
They became my unique treasures during college. It was a requirement in architecture school that we keep sketchbooks to show the progression of our design and to always have them when outdoors walking around so we could learn how to quickly sketch buildings. There was also one rule in school - show them to no one. That's right, how artist love to share and comment on their sketchbooks, we were told the opposite that they were a place of sanctuary - a place to make ugly mistakes without judgement.
The only hitch is that if a sketchbook doesn't have a lock on it like a diary, it will be looked at. My solution at the time was to get only sketchbooks that could fit into my purse. There is a unwritten code that we should never look into a woman's purse & that provided the sanctuary needed. Overtime, the purse turned into a bag that went with me when I wanted to sketch. Creativity spilled out and the bag/satchel would become part of the decorative cover of my sketchbook. Then I became so attached to that specific sketchbook being partnered to the bag that when I retired the book to my library, so did the bag.   
By now you can see where I'm leading to with a blog title of 'Weaving Story.' I have woven a couple of bags/purses/satchels to hold my sketchbooks. The most infamous one I made super quick was the Cookie Monster purse pictured. I've progressed on from the plain weave to the multitude of texturally enthralling weaves that I now share in my Woven Purse class. 
​Lets go over a few that I cover:

The plain weave (also called the tabby weave) is a great way to start a sold weave & separate more complex weaves. Its the weaving equivalent to marching in place during aeorbics.

This image provided by Fibers and Design show a combination of bubble weave with twinning.

Hello Hydrangea provided an image of filled bubbles with rya loops.

Mirrix Loom provided a good image of Pick and Pick aka vertical stripes because who doesn't like stripes?

Soumak weave shown by A Pretty Fix is way of adding that X-dimension to your purses.

An added bonus to the Soumak is that you can turn it into a fishtail braid.

Telerama Weaving uses bold colours to show what you can do with Angle Weaving.

How awesome is this?! The Weaving Loom provided a picture of Chevron Weave.

Most of these weaves herald from Persian rugs. This top weave is thus called the Persian Weave image from Rustic Thread de Lola.

To break all convention I like to add on Rya Loops show here from The Weaving Loom.

There is different avenues to learn how to tapestry weave. The one thing that I provide different from them is how to continuously weave to create a bag. If you are interested in creating a bag in a day with me. Click the link below to register to my in-person class coming up January 30th, 2021 at the Art Students League of Denver.

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