My book, The Art of Tapestry Weaving, is a tapestry techniques book. Published in November of 2020, I wrote it for my students and for anyone interested in tapestry weaving. I wanted to write a book that would become the reference that is always beside your loom. The book is quite comprehensive and I believe will be a great resource for beginners and more experienced practitioners alike.
There are always things that there isn’t room for in a book, even one that is 300 pages long, so I’m devoting some blog time to addressing frequent questions from readers of the book. I probably get the most questions from beginners about yarn. The video below was one that I did during launch week of the book in November and I think many people missed it because it was part of the launch.
The video talks about how I approach yarn in the book including starting with an anchor yarn. The information about yarn starts at about minute 1.
What do I mean by anchor yarn?
I chose four yarns that could become your anchor yarn for the book. There are, of course, many others you could pick. When I say “anchor yarn,” I mean that you have a yarn you work with exclusively for awhile so that you learn all the intricacies of it while you’re learning how to weave tapestry. Learning to manage your materials in tapestry takes some practice. If you switch the yarn you’re using constantly, it is going to be difficult to learn how to manage the material effectively. The hardest thing for new weavers is mastering weft tension which means how much weft goes into any portion of the tapestry. The weft tension changes with every different yarn you use, so if you mix lots of yarns or use a different yarn for every piece you weave, it is harder to get a handle on this skill.
I recommend beginners choose one yarn and weave with it until they start to understand how to manage weft. This means that you’re able to weave a piece and keep the warps more or less evenly spaced, maintain the shape of the tapestry without having big areas where it gets wider or narrower, and the warps are all evenly covered with a nice fabric surface. Once you have reached this holy grail of production, then the yarn world is yours to explore.
The four anchor yarns I chose for the book were ones that are readily available, I am reasonably sure they will remain in production into the future, and they have some variety of color selection. They are Harrisville Highland, Frid, Fårö, and weaversbazaar. I talk more about these four yarns in the video above and in the book.
Other tapestry yarn resources
I have a deep love affair with yarn. Because of this, I’ve written a great deal on my blog about yarns for tapestry. If you’d like more information, take a look at these posts.
All the yarn posts are collected in the Yarn category on the blog HERE.
Other resources
More information about The Art of Tapestry Weaving is HERE. You can order your copy HERE. (That is an affiliate link. I get a very tiny amount if you order through it, but more importantly, it supports independent bookshops.)
If you’re looking for further education in tapestry weaving and you’re pretty new to the art form, take a look at my online course, Warp and Weft: Learning the Structure of Tapestry Weaving.
Woven samples of the four anchor yarns used in The Art of Tapestry Weaving by Rebecca Mezoff.
Top L-R: Harrisville Highland, Fårö. Bottom L-R: weaversbazaar, Frid.
If you’re new to tapestry, have you settled on a yarn to start with? It is okay to start with whatever you have, but remember that frustration with things not working out might well be due to the materials you’re using, not you! My spinning teacher, Maggie Casey, loves to say that the problem is always the wheel, not the spinner. In the world of tapestry, the problem is often your yarn! The last tip I’ll give for beginners is to purchase a cone of 12/6 or 12/9 cotton seine twine for warp. It makes all the difference and for small tapestries, it’ll last you a very long time!