Why not just get online? I’ve done both. Since Covid, I have to say that online offerings are more varied, better produced and informative. JST School of Weaving, School of Sweet Georgia (SOS) and Vavstuga School of Weaving are just a few. Vavstuga being the only one that is offering online classes as well as their more extensive in person offerings.
When I first started weaving around 2003 I spent a week at Harrisville Designs I took a Learning to Weave class by Deborah Chandler. She asked each of us what we wanted to learn, well … I had been struggling on my on with dressing the loom, and I had tried some of the weirdest methods (thought up in my own mind) to make warping the loom easier. There were EPIC failures. There aren’t any shortcuts for winding on a well tensioned warp! I told Deborah that my goal was to dress the loom and weave off a project for each of the 5 days I was at class. At night I would use some computer software to plan the next day’s warp.
Sometime mid-week Debbie asked me what I was planning for that day and someone mumbled “walk on water”. I wasn’t at all offended. It meant that I was seen as a serious and dedicated student. I had music to listen to, I worked constantly, I wasn’t there to socialize. I’m basically a Super Nerd when it comes to this kind of thing. Debbie Chandler’s class at Harrisville Designs sustained me for the next decade or so, while I experimented with weave structures and different projects. I wove cloth to make my son a full length cloak, I learned to do double wide weaving and made a handspun blanket. I made placemats and towels and scarves and shawls. I was able to take that class and use it as a launching pad. I would not be weaving today without it.
I was happily weaving away and even trying out 8 shafts on my jack loom when I discovered that I had to do some fancy tie up’s when using all 8 shafts or I was going to struggle with lifting too many shafts. I didn’t know what it was called but I had to use tie-ups that required 2 feet. It took days of paper and pencil and then experimentation to figure it out. That’s when I discovered Glimakra looms. Some one on Ravelry was selling her Glimakra loom. I read up on it, learned that they were big, easy to treadle (hmm, I NEEDED that feature) and had a learning curve! The more I researched it, the more I liked what I read.
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| The first project on the Glimakra, before Vavstuga. | Weaving on the first project! |
Then it came down to new? or used? Knowing what I know now, I would have bought the used loom. BUT I was young and foolish. My Ravelry friends encouraged me to buy the used loom. One argument was I could go to Vavstuga with the money I save. Vavstuga??? THEN I researched that. Vavstuga had only Swedish looms. They had countermarch and counter balance. So I contacted the gal in New England and tried to set up a deal. She and I could not agree on amount or payment, and one day, across the dinner table my husband mumbles “I don’t know why you don’t just buy a new one” So I bought a new 120 cm, vertical countermarch Glimakra from my dear friend Lois at Bountiful Spin & Weave. AND I signed up for a basics class at Vavstuga for my first Summer in retirement!