I wasn’t sure that I would weave a sample as I already knew that 30epi was a great sett for 28/2 yarn and a twill pattern from Warp 46, and I liked the pattern as shown in WeaveIT.
So I jumped into the weaving – I hemstitched on 2 picks of plain weave with the blue yarn, wove a single pattern repeat in blue and a single pattern repeat of purple. I looked at the pattern on the loom and wasn’t sure how it would work once it was off the loom and wet-finished. So, I wove a blue zinger and 3 picks of purple. Then I hemstitched in purple on 2 picks of plain weave.

In order to be able to remove with sample fabric from the loom with a minimum of loom loss, I left a 2cm gap, wove 10 picks of plain weave with some waste yarn, inserted 2 sticks (on opposite plain weave treadles) and wove a further 10 picks of plain weave. I then cut the fabric from the loom and wet finished it (hand washed in warm water, hot pressed, laid flat to dry). I decided that I like the way that the cloth feels, but not the pattern. There is insufficient definition of the colours.

So, back to the weaving software for a little more playing. I decided that the simplest way to bring more definition to the red/purple area was to change the tie-up to a more basic 3/1 twill with a couple modifications to reduce float length; this also introduces a little interest on the points of the diamonds. I have called this pattern 3B. I decided to tie the treadles up so that I had 2-4 shafts per treadle as this would make depressing the treadles easier than if I had 5 shafts tied to a treadle.

I decided that I should begin by weaving another sample and another 2-stick header. This time, I remembered to measure the fabric before wet finishing. The blue merino yarn shrinks a little more than the kid mohair/merino yarn, so a curve is introduced after wet finishing.

I am very happy with this pattern, the colours and the finished cloth. So the next step is to weave the fabric!

	Blue yarn	Purple yarn
Pre-wash	65.5 x 4.25cm	67 x 5cm
Post-wash	63.5 x 4cm	66 x 5cm