Project 6: Ajax researched the use of symbolism in the worship of Athena, thinking about the designs on the Panathenaian peplos. He wove himself a cloth and embroidered on symbols of Athena: owl, serpents, olives, and a spider. He is taking his work to Greece this summer to visit her temples!

Project 5: Simon focused his dye exploration on indigotin specifically, researching indigo- and woad-derived indigo dyes compared to murex. He dyed a cotton shirt and wool roving in an indigo vat he prepared, using the same dye as Iris. Cf. the range of colors between Iris's black and Simon's blue!

Project 4: Iris was curious about the color-fastness of natural dyes compared to modern acid dyes. She used madder, turmeric, and indigo and compared their wear after various types of washing and UV exposure. Check out how strongly black indigo can be when concentrated!

Project 3: Creusa studied the interaction between geometric motifs on home objects like vases and weaving patterns. Her piece, woven on a table loom, is an imagined "practice piece" of a young Athenian girl, learning to weave and copying the patterns on the items around her.

Callisto was interested in testing natural dyes on linen and wool (felted merino patches). Her gorgeous yellow is the expensive and prized saffron, and you can see why! The purple and pink are logwood and madder, and she mordanted with gallnut and alum. The new-world logwood replaces expensive murex

Project 1: Nausicaa has been sailing all of her life, and brought her expertise into her final project on ancient sails. She wove sails herself out of linen thread and rigged them to a 3D printed trireme. Note the reinforced webbing over the joins - real sails are too big to weave in 1 piece.

Stay tuned for a bunch of posts about the magnificent final projects that are being finished up! And if you happen to be at WashU, check out our upcoming studio show!

Not surprising to hear from somebody called "ArchaeoPoo" XD

That's a nice warping time. For the weighted loom, I prepared a warp for them ahead of time with a tablet woven starting band, and in class we just lashed it to the cloth bar, tied on the weights, and knit the heddles, which took most of our time.

totally! feel free to email me at b.kamens@wustl.edu

As far as I know, we don't have any reference to that particular method (though I could be wrong!) But I did show my students a video of Gaelic waulking in class (and one of Korean fulling, drumming with sticks).

We also looked at some of the remarkable preserved textiles from Egypt. These are three pieces from the Louvre collections: A long pleated linen tunic from 2035-1875 BCE, a short linen shirt from 800-540BCE, and a wool shirt from Roman Egypt, 320-430 CE.

before and after fulling. You can definitely see the difference!

Heat + water + agitation + wool = felt, so it's tricky to dye roving and keep it usable for spinning. I have been spinning a bit from my cochineal dyed roving, and while it's harder to draft, it's not impossible! It does stain my hands a brilliant pink as I go.
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One you have an extract, you can get dyeing! The cochineal produced a surprising lovely pink, the logwood a great purple, and the madder a paler orange, though all are 'billed' as 'red' dyes. The osage produces the expected yellow.
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First you apply a mordant to the fiber to help the dye bond with the fiber and stay fast even through washing. For wool, alum is a common ancient and modern mordant. Meanwhile, you create dye extracts by cooking the dyestuffs in water and straining off the liquid repeatedly
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