A celebration of textural textiles to accompany the launch of Ann Richards’ book “Weaving Textiles That Shape Themselves”, and Lotte Dalgaard’s related book Magic Materials to Weave, is currently on show at the Handweavers’ Studio and Gallery in Finsbury Park, London until 13th June 2012.

After exploring both structure and high twist yarns for over twenty years, Ann Richards was finally persuaded to put her considerable talent and research into a book. Richards came to weaving from a biological background, and this science-based research discipline has been the ground-work for her explorations into this fascinating field. Systematically and rigorously, structure, yarn, and elements of yarn construction have been considered, utilised and combined to create a collection of incredible textural fabrics. Richards does the brain work so that the fabrics shape themselves once off the loom and finished.

The exhibition contains many of the fabrics that have charted Richards’ progress in this enquiry, including some that were originally featured in Ann Sutton’s influential Ideas in Weaving. There are some handlooms set up with sample warps that visitors to the exhibition can try their hand at to see for themselves the amazing results that come with the combinations of active and passive yarns, and weave structure.

Lotte Dalgaard from Denmark has also been investigating in the same field for many years, but with a fashion fabric approach. In collaboration with Danish fashion designer Ann Schmidt, she develops cloth that can be manipulated around the female form to create pleated garments in various silhouettes. Utilising the shape-fitting propensity of the fabrics to mould around the body, and to gather in pleats where the fabric is relaxed, ingenious forms can be made using non-traditional shaping, often without cutting into the cloth.
The exhibition features many examples of these two accomplished weavers’ work and is supplemented with pieces from weavers from around the world – other contributors to Richards’ book, and the exhibition, include Junichi Arai, Reiko Sudo, Deidre Wood and many others from the UK, US, Europe, Australia, New Zealand and Japan.

Just add water -  textiles that shape themselves

Weaving Textiles That Shape Themselves sounds like a contradiction in terms, but this sets out to show how textiles can do precisely that: shape themselves. Good design, in any medium, cannot simply be imposed – it depends also on what materials and structures can do. The designer may choose what elements to put together, but their subtle interplay will determine what happens, sometimes in surprising ways. Woven textiles show this ’self-organizing’ tendency to an extreme extent, especially when there are strong contrasts of material and structure. Textures emerge during wet finishing, as fibre, yarn twist and weave structure interact. The most dramatic effects are possible with high-twist (crepe) yarns and these form the main of the book.

Crepe yarns can create their three-dimensional effects because the stress of the spinning process gives them a lot of energy. This is released when the fabric is washed – as water is absorbed, spiralling movements of the yarns form crinkles and pleats, giving highly textured, elastic fabrics. Yarn twists and weaves can also be varied across the fabric, so rectangular pieces change shape when washed. ‘Loom-to-body’ clothing, needing minimal cutting and sewing, can emerge from a simple change of yarn or structure – textiles really can shape themselves.

Textiles by a variety of designers and artists are included – Junichi Arai, Reiko Sudo, Ann Sutton, Lotte Dalgaard and many others.

The book is published by Crowood Press (www.crowood.com) Price: £25.

There will be a book launch/exhibition at Handweavers Studio in London on Thursday 17th May 2012. This will be a joint event with Lotte Dalgaard, whose book “Magiske Materialer” (published in Danish in 2006) will come out this year in an English Edition (“Magical Materials To Weave”). Textiles included in both books, together with new work, will be on display.

Handweavers Studio and Gallery
140 Seven Sisters Road
London N7 7NS

For details of the location and more information about this event see the website: www.handweavers.co.uk