My Articles

One of my articles, ‘Fun With Advancing Twills,’ appeared in the June 2010 issue of the Complex Weavers Journal and may be viewed by clicking here.

My other article, ‘Shadow Weave and Log Cabin,’ appeared in the June 2008 issue of the Complex Weavers Journal and was showcased on the Complex Weavers website.  Here are excerpts and images from that article:

Shadow Weave and Log Cabin

by Eva Stossel

Fine Threads Study Group

“I have always been intrigued by weaving patterns that appear complex but structurally are very simple. Shadow weave, a color-and-weave effect and mostly plain weave structure, has amazing possibilities.

“The blocks of horizontal and vertical stripes in shadow weave usually follow a twill-step sequence, and two adjacent blocks weave together in the pattern. I wanted my plain weave blocks to be independent of each other, so I realized that I needed something a little different than the commonly used Atwater and Powell methods. I searched the color-and weave drafts at handweaving.net and came across a draft (52461) in which each block had its own distinct pair of shafts. Hmmm, is this log cabin but with more than two blocks? Yes!

“Using Microsoft Excel, I started designing profile drafts using 8 threading blocks and 8 treadling blocks, pushing the limits of my faithful 16-shaft Macomber loom. After I finally chose the profile draft….

“As you can see in the drawdown, each block is threaded twice with an extra thread added at the turning points – the even numbered shafts with a dark colored thread and the odd-numbered shafts with a light colored thread.  Treadling is tromp as writ (rising shed).”

Profile Draft 1

Weaving Draft

Shadow Weave Sample 1