Tarndwarndcoort workshop

I have just been fortunate enough to have a 3 day workshop with Cresside Collette. We went to an historic farmhouse in Victoria, Tarndwarndcoort. It was a quirky house, built over several generations.  I reminded me very much of Le Manoir, in France, that I visited when I did a tapestry tour with Cresside, several years ago.

The original house was built in 1840, when Victoria didn't exist. It was part of New South Wales. Subsequent generations added to the house, in ways that have caused interesting ups and downs inside. We were taken on a tour of the site with Tom Dennis, one of the 6th generation that owns the property. He told us quite a lot of family tales about settling the property and its subsequent development. 

I was also interested to learn that the Polwarth breed of sheep was developed on this property.  Who knew that Australia had its own sheep breeds? Not me! (Yes, I know that my link is to Wikipedia, which has had bad press here lately.)

A flock of sheep has been bred that is coloured.  

We had a lovely walk around the property and the sheep kept a wary eye on the strange people wandering around.  There were lambs that needed protecting, so they kept away from us and kept an eye on us too.

The wool is usually sold to crafters.  The shop on the property had some lovely wool tops, dyed wool and spun wool.  I was very tempted to buy some wool for felting or knitting but restrained myself, I was there to do tapestry weaving. 

We did get some lovely photos of the surrounding vistas.

Tapestry weaving the traditional European way at Aubusson

We visited various studios during the trip to Aubusson, to see modern tapestry weaving.  All of the weavers we visited used the traditional method of weaving from the back, with the cartoon underneath the work and mirrors to check the progress of the work.

The weaver sits on the bar and leans against the loom.  Often they put a cushion between the loom and stomach to make it more comfortable.

The cartoon is laid under the warp and the weaving is checked with a mirror. 

Pedals separate the warps. Several weavers can work together on the one piece.

Lifting the warp and inserting the bobbin (called the flute).

The tapestries we saw were all large, often using a small warp per centimetre measurement.  Here you can see Francoise weaving very quickly, sometimes with a single warp being lifted, other times several warps.  It is quite different from the way we weave and requires a different way of moving the warps up and down.  Pedals are used to separate the shed and there are a large number of bobbins in use.