Thoughts on weaving alone and in company

For most of my life I have pursued creative activities in solitude and often in silence.  Not a heavy oppressive type of solitude and silence but rather the sort that makes you feel untethered, ready to float away on any passing flight of fancy.  I suppose this made sense when my main creative outlets were writing of one sort of another.  It is possible, but not easy, to write well on a crowded and noisy train.  To write well whilst actively having an interesting conversation seems to verge on impossible.  Knitting is possible in congenial company - although not if wrangling gansey or fair isle patterns or trying to count an endlessly flexible number of stitches.  But mostly I find my most creative moments occur when I’m on my own.  Maybe that’s just the condition I need to get into anything akin to a flow state.  Or maybe life is mostly so busy and full of interruption and segue that the creative moment passes unnoticed in the melee.   

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I do think a certain courage is required to create ‘in public’.  Ideas and schemes often need a quiet space to grow and to be tested.  If I’m on my own, I don’t have to explain myself or what I’m doing.  I don’t have to provide an impromptu lesson.  I don’t have to listen to someone’s else’s stories about what they have done, are doing, would like to do, would hate to do…  I can fool around with stupid ideas and bury them in the bottom of the bin if they are never going to work, or the bottom of a drawer if I still believe that one day the stars will align.

And yet…

I mostly weave on my own.  I sit with a mug of tea and the radio on (usually cricket if there’s any to be found) and I warp looms and bundle wefts and ponder why what looked good on paper isn’t working in yarn.  Sometimes I daydream or think of other things, but mostly I’m very focused.  There is always so much to think about– design decisions, practicalities, problem solving, is the piece doing what I want it to do…does it makes sense?  And woven through these warp thoughts are the weft ones of ‘where did I put my scissors?’ ‘why don’t I own the perfect shade of dusky pink?’ ‘why have I run out of bundles again?’  ‘why did I choose this sett?’ and so on.

And yet…

I didn’t learn alone.  I went to what once would have been called an ‘evening class’.  There were five of us in the group plus a tutor.  Three of us stuck out the eight weeks and came back for more.  We learned everything we could need to get us going – and we chatted.  And sometimes the tutor would tell us to shut up and concentrate (not in those words!) and I would ponder the premise of adult education.  Take a class to meet people!  Take a class to learn a new skill!  And sometimes those aims seemed mutually exclusive.  As we got more confident, we found that we could warp up a loom and talk at the same time without disaster ensuing.  So, I developed skills in weaving and learned some of the stories these new people had to tell. 

And now…

I still mostly weave alone which suits me fine.  But I currently spend three days every few months in the company of seven other weavers and a tutor on the Foundation Tapestry Weaving Diploma at West Dean College.  We spend about 10 or 12 hours a day together, learning, weaving, having tea breaks and meals…and talking.  We discuss books we’ve read, places we’ve been, suppliers of weft, our secret feelings about colour, our life stories, our holiday plans, our ambitions (for our lives, our reading, our weaving…).  I could pop my feminist hat on and write proudly about sisterhood, about confidence and belief and vulnerability and strength and how they twine through our conversations, creating our group identity as we weave.  I could say so much, but as I drove home, I thought mostly (and selfishly) about the impact of the group on my weaving.  Sometimes individual conversations, suggestions or affirmations could light up my work, making it stronger and better.  But even when weaving wasn’t being discussed there was something about the atmosphere that made me feel more confident and comfortable with what I was doing.  Maybe it was that the gentle conversation (and equally gentle and powerful silence) produced the conditions to weave without overthinking.  We all wove, surrounded by our chosen detritus of colour, and there felt to be some kind of collective belief in what we were doing.  That it made sense, that it was right to be there giving our time and energy to this activity.  That wherever our weaving might take us, being part of a collective, even transiently, made the weaving better.  It also allowed me not to concentrate- to let the weaving be woven without overthinking it.  My hands and my weaving brain worked away quietly whilst my conscious brain was otherwise employed. 

Obviously, I can only speak for myself – others might find weaving in company to be frustration, distracting or stifling.  But for me, weaving in company adds depth to my work and builds my belief in what I am doing.

Thank you to A, H, M, M, N, N & W.