Books and Online Resources
This list is far from exhaustive: these are the resources that I’ve encountered on my band weaving journey thus far which I recommend. When I start learning a new craft—rather than taking small bites and chewing thoroughly—I tend to dive in headfirst and then figure out the basics as I go, so some of this material may seem advanced. My best advice to beginners is to go at your own pace and to experiment to find what works for you. There’s a lot you can do with band weaving once you get the hang of it.
Within their categories, resources are listed in alphabetic order. General
Facebook Groups for Learners
In general, I recommend joining the private Facebook groups, because they’re less likely to have spam than in the open groups. Typically, even though they say they’re private, all you have to do is answer a few questions and agree to the group’s rules. The easiest way to find a post is to click on the Media tab of the group’s home page. You can also go to the Members tab and click on a person’s name to view all the posts a person had made within the group.
Inkle Weaving—This group is also a great mixture of tablet weaving and inkle weaving. There’s always great support for beginners and beyond.
Inkle Weaving for Beginners—This group has a mixture of tablet weaving and inkle weaving, and they’re always willing to help out if you run into trouble. They also have a great Files page that mostly has documents put together by Mari Voipio that have information on historic band weaving.
Band Designing Software
These are web-based software, and they’re currently free. They have a lot of features, so check out the instructions/manual pages to see just how powerful they are.
Seizenn | loom pattern editor (raktres.net)—Among other things, this site can be used for inkle and card woven bands. There’s also a blog that goes along with it to show some features of the editor( Raktres.net – Projects hosting ). There is also an app available for android and iOS, but I haven’t played with them yet.
Tablet Weaving Draft Designer (jamespbarrett.github.io)—This one is also a powerful tool, but it’s limited to tablet woven bands.
TwistedThreads.org –TwistedThreads focusses on tablet weaving, and is different from the other two in that you have access to things that other users have designed. The designs on there are amazing, so—even if you don’t feel up to designing your own band—check out some of the things that people have shared.
Inkle Weaving Books
In Celebration of Plainweave by Annie MacHale is available in print (with spiral binding, which makes it easy to use as a reference book) or as an eBook. This book also has codes that can be used to pull up the patterns on SeiZenn to manipulate the colors and use them as a springboard for design.
Three-Color Pickup for Inkle Weavers by Annie MacHale has a lot of interesting designs that are done in a pickup technique that is awesome for people who are just starting out with pick up, because it’s easier warp and weave to do than Baltic Pickup, which is another popular technique, but you still get the same quality of designs. This book also has codes that can be used to pull up the patterns on SeiZenn to manipulate the colors and use them as a springboard for design.
The Weaver’s Inkle Pattern Directory by Anne Dixon is a great resource, because it shows multiple bands woven in many inkle weaving techniques. It’s a great springboard for further research, and it gives you an idea of what your inkle loom can really do.
Weaving Patterned Bands: How to Create and Design with 5, 7, and 9 Pattern Threads by Susan J Foulkes has amazing color work on Baltic style pickup bands. She also has sections that explain how the bands were traditionally used.
Blogs
Annie MacHale’s Blog-- https://aspinnerweaver.blogspot.com/ --Annie MacHale has amazing things on her blog. From free patterns to learning tutorials. If you like what you see, she also has books available on plain weave and pickup, and the designs are amazing!
Laverne Waddington’s Blog-- https://backstrapweaving.wordpress.com/ --Laverne Waddington does amazing work! As the name suggests, her blog focuses on backstrap weaving, but a lot of the techniques can be applied to Inkle weaving as well. Her blog has a lot of pictures of finished projects that are great for getting ideas. She’s also written several books that focus on specific techniques. Especially check out the tutorials section.
Jennifer Williams’s Blog-- https://inkledpink.com/about/ --This blog is an amazing source of inspiration for what can
be done with finished inkle woven bands! She hasn’t posted in a while, but there’s almost a decade of content on her blog.
Tablet Weaving Resources
Card Weaving by Candace Crockett has a very in depth explanation of how to get started with tablet weaving— including multiple ways to wind a warp for your tablets--and she shows multiple advanced techniques. Rather than step by step patterns, Candace Crockett gives detailed explanations if techniques and recipes for the bands shown in the books, which leaves a lot of room for creativity.
Color Coded Tablet Weaving by Mark Cook is a great place to start tablet weaving, because the color coding makes it easy to follow the patterns. The only thing to be careful about is that he color codes his patterns with slightly different colors than the typical commercially available cards, so you may find it helpful to make yourself a key.
Tablets at Work by Claudia Woolny is a wonderful bilingual (English and German) book that delves deep into different techniques of tablet weaving. Unlike a lot of the other reference books available, it’s printed in full color. It’s almost like a modern textbook with more than 180 photos of bands woven for this book. Some of the bands are based on historic designs, and some are original patterns.
Tablet Weaving Magic by Otfried Staudigel is a bilingual (English and German) book on double faced tablet weaving, which is a wonderful rabbit hole that I’ve recently fallen into that produces patterns with inverted images on the back of the band rather than the typical jagged looking pattern on the back.
Blogs, YouTube Channels and Videos, and Facebook Groups
Inkle Loom Pattern Directory—A Facebook group with a bunch of free patterns that are a great place to start. There are a variety of patterns for four holed cards and beyond.
Elewys of Finchingefeld—An amazing YouTube channel that focuses on historical tablet weaving, which encompasses a variety of techniques. I highly recommend checking out the videos in the Tablet Weaving Tutorial Playlist and her videos “Tablet Weaving for the Absolute Beginner” and “10 Things to do with Your Tablet Woven Bands”.
Why is my Tablet Weaving Pattern on the Bottom?? Answered—is a YouTube video by Ellisif Gydasdottir that explains how to turn your cards to fix your band if you’ve threaded S and Z wrong.
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