April 2022 Members’ Day The focus for the day was spinning. We had demonstrations of combing, blending board and picker. As usual there was also a lot of chat and a bit of show and tell! Sheila had brought her double weave samples to give people a clearer idea of what the May workshop is about. Aileen was wearing a … Read More
September 2021 Johnny Shiels, Wheel Maker
Another interesting meeting I wasn’t able to attend! Enclosed is the write up from Norah: JohnnyShiels
August 2021 All About Cotton
I wasn’t able to attend this meeting, so the write up is thanks to Liz. I clearly missed a very interesting meeting which looked at spinning, weaving and dyeing cotton, with contributions from several of our members. It’s attached here as a document: Cotton spinning
Flax Workshop April 2021
Guild member Sophie presented this workshop. There is a long history of flax growing in Friesland in the Netherlands where Sophie lives. As recently as 150 years ago everyone had a small field of flax, which the women spun into linen yarn for shirts, nightwear, children’s clothes, lace etc. The woman who taught Sophie to spin flax was taught by … Read More
Fleece Workshop March 2021
Amanda Hannaford ran this workshop, which focussed on fleece – the different properties of fleece from a variety of breeds, how to process and spin them to get the best from them, and what the resulting yarn can be used for. She started by showing us samples of short, medium and long stapled fleece processed in different ways. First a … Read More
Silk Spinning February 2021
Jaine Mahon of (Skye Silks) gave us a wonderful workshop on silk spinning via Zoom on the morning of 13 February. She started by taking us on a tour of her studio, showing us some of her lovely handwoven silk scarves, and other handwoven and hand dyed items, then on to spinning. She had made up boxes, beautifully packaged, containing … Read More
Open Day and Challenge 8 Febrary 2020
Between 40 and 50 people attended this event, with some coming and going in the course of the day. We had a big circle of spinners around the hall, with several weavers at tables as well. This was the day to bring along what we had made from the fibre distributed at the September Open Day: 50 gms Corriedale tops, … Read More
Spinning workshops 11 & 12 January 2020
The Spinning for Beginners workshop, run by Michelle Stirling on 11 January seems to have gone very well – here is a write up from Inga: As is very common at guild events the air at the beginning of the session seemed full of anticipation for a day of crafting fun, and Michelle did not disappoint! The day was full … Read More
Spin to Weave Workshop October 2019
I was too late to book for this workshop, run by Christina Chisholm, but visited it to take photos. When I arrived Christina was demonstrating how to avoid wasting precious handspun when using it as warp. She had a strong, commercially spun yarn, wound onto the back beam of her loom, and threaded through heddles and reed. A handspun warp, … Read More
Ann Artis – Daft Batts
‘Daft Batts’, a workshop tutored by Anne Artis. (pictures below) Anne Artis, an ever popular tutor from Callander, was joined by twenty-one Highland Guild members for her workshop entitled ‘Daft Batts’. We were invited to come prepared with a variety of fibre preparation tools but, in fact, only needed access to a drum carder after an initial session with hand … Read More
Feb 2019 Open Day and Challenge
Another good day, with 30 plus people attending, and a shared lunch. Most people were spinning; Sheila had brought along a book charka to spin cotton. Click on the pictures to see more detail. The focus of the day though was the Guild challenge. This started at the September meeting, when those participating had been asked to bring 100 gms … Read More
options
You can scroll through the list, or select a category…
Long Draw Successes
Serena sent in these pics of the Long Draw Spinning workshop. She writes “Great workshop today with Odet Beauvoisin showing us how to do long draw for woollen and worsted yarn. I think most of us got it some of the time. Interesting that Odet is such a proficient spinner that she had to add in neps to make her … Read More
Speed Spinning with Anne Artis
Twelve spinners, with an interesting variety of wheels, attended Anne Artis’ workshop on Speed Spinning at Strathpeffer. The workshop started with Anne giving us each a carrier bag containing individual bags of fleece to spin, all of them very different and some of them fairly challenging. The bags were numbered 1 – 10 and the contents varied from commercially prepared … Read More
Art Yarns with Isobel McCallum Scott
The Art Yarn Workshop with Isobel was a great success. If you think you knew about spinning – do go to one of her classes and learn much more. Mindful that average wheels would be in use, the class was adapted so we all achieved interesting fancy yarns. Beehives, wraps, coils and many more – all techniques that could be … Read More
- Page 1 of 2
- 1
- 2