Textiles Workshop

Last week on Thursday the 3^rd of  November we had an exciting day. We had a man called Steve Wilson, also known as Steve the Weave. He came in to show us how to make felt and he also showed us how to weave. It was a brilliant day and we all learnt a lot. I  enjoyed all of the morning but I enjoyed the weaving best. Class 3 did the workshop in the morning and Class 2 did the workshop in the afternoon. Class 3’s theme was Autumn and Class 2’s theme was Christmas. Some of the year 4’s joined Class 2. We were in groups of 5.

He introduced himself, then we got started. In our group there was Molly , Emma, Iain, and me. We had Emma on the slides, Iain on the cotton and me and Molly on the bar. We all had to work together so we could get something done.

It didn’t seem like you were doing anything but then all of a sudden you would have loads. Every so often our cotton would run out so we would have to change the cotton. You had to put the loom on a metal stick, then you had to turn a handle with one hand and with the other hand run your hand from side to side and you would end up with loads of cotton on your loom. When we first did it, it went all wrong and we ended up with cotton all on one side and right up the pole.

When we made the felt we had to get all the different colour wool to make our Autumn pictures. Then we had to put all our wool in place to make our pictures. Then after that we had to pour hot water on our pictures, and roll them up in a bamboo mat and each roll it 40 times. It was very tiring but it was worth it. Then we unrolled it and then Steve took it away. We had a bit of a shock because he scrunched it up in a ball. But then we found out that he was doing it because he wanted to get all the water out of it.

It was a brilliant day and I would recommend it to anybody.

Article by Erin Tubman.

See examples of Textiles from the workshop in our School Art & Craft section.

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