overshot on rigid heddle loom factory

Crazyshot - creative overshot weaving - introduces anyone who uses a rigid heddle loom to a whole world of creative weaving. Using just one heddle and one pick-up stick, you"ll explore color, design, and texture, taking your weaving to the next level. Complete step-by-step instructions are included for weaving all 14 designs in this book. Also provided are how-tos for the single heddle overshot technique, reading charts for the rigid heddle loom, and finishing techniques, along with lots of tips and tricks for successful and satisfying results. Complex patterning is easier than it looks with this simple charted technique. All you need are basic rigid heddle warping and weaving skills to start your next weaving adventure!

With one heddle and one stick, Myra Wood explores the art of working with ground and pattern wefts in this creative approach to rigid-heddle weaving. Known for her for colorwork across many mediums, Myra beautifully illustrates that complex does not have to be complicated. --Liz Gipson, Author of A Weaver"s Guide to Yarn and other books for rigid-heddle weaving and the host of the Yarnworker School

Whenever I hear a rigid-heddle loom referred to as a “beginner’s loom,” I can’t help but shake my head in disappointment, for while the loom itself might be simple, it is capable of producing complex cloth. If anything, the rigid-heddle loom is an everybody sort of loom—so I’m here to dispel some rigid-heddle weaving myths.

Let’s start with the thing I hear the most, that the rigid-heddle loom is a gateway loom to “real weaving.” Just typing that makes me cringe. It’s true, the rigid-heddle loom is perfect for people new to weaving. It is significantly less expensive than a multishaft loom, takes up far less space, and isn’t complicated or intimidating to those just learning the difference between warp and weft. Saying something is good for beginners, though, doesn’t mean it’s automatically useless for more advanced weavers. Sometimes you want to weave a project but don’t want to spend the hours needed to wind and warp a floor loom. Sometimes you want to just play with color and texture. Sometimes you want to weave outside. For all those times, there’s the rigid-heddle loom.

This one always makes me roll my eyes. The rigid-heddle loom is a very simple loom that’s set up to weave plain weave, but a simple loom does not mean simple cloth. Backstrap looms are very simple looms, and yet they are used to produce some of the most intricate weaving out there. Rigid-heddle looms make hand manipulation of threads much easier, and with the aid of a simple pick-up stick or two, you can create designs that would take dozens of shafts. You can also use hand-manipulation techniques to create warp or weft floats, Danish medallions, rya, Brooks bouquet, and other wonderful designs.

Okay, so this is less a rigid-heddle myth and more of an all-of-weaving myth. For some reason, plain weave has become synonymous with boring, similar to vanilla, and I’m sorry, but I love both plain weave and vanilla. Plain weave is a great structure for playing with color—you can weave stripes, plaids, or seemingly complex color-and-weave designs in plain weave. Use plain weave to showcase yarns with fun textures or color variegation. If you think plain weave is boring, then you’re doing it wrong.

First off, I just want to say that a real weaving yarn is whatever yarn you choose to weave with, whether it’s a run-of-the-mill 8/2 cotton or a crazy, textured handspun art yarn. If you can weave with a yarn, it’s a weaving yarn. That said, you can use yarns such as 8/2 cotton on your rigid-heddle loom to weave towels and napkins and whatever else you like. You can even use silks on the rigid-heddle loom. It’s true that “knitting” yarns and fashion yarns work beautifully on rigid-heddle looms, but there is no reason you can’t use other yarns on the rigid-heddle loom, too!

So there you have it, the rigid-heddle loom is a loom for every level of weaver, whether you want to weave nothing but beautiful plain weave or experiment with complex pick-up designs. It’s the kind of loom that you can enjoy and explore for years to come.

If you are lucky enough to have a local shop nearby that supports weaving, please support them.  They can give you personal handholding when you need it, and they offer you the invaluable service of allowing you to get hands-on experience when picking your yarn, fiber, and equipment. Consider your loom, book, and other materials support of this service.

This page includes affiliate links from Amazon. I encourage you to support your local retailer, although I fully recognize not everyone is lucky enough to have a local book or weaving store nearby. The small income from these links help fund this site.

Craftsy/BluPrint was recently purchased by TN Marketing. There were a number of rigid-heddle classes available under the Craftsy brand. Keep an eye on their website for updates.

Below are manufacturers that currently manufacture rigid heddle looms. You may find other discontinued looms at a garage sale or online. Although they may seem like a bargain, many of the current loom manufactures have redesigned or reissued their looms with today’s weaver in mind. Buying a good tool is always worth the price!

*These manufactures have updated their loom designs. If you first experienced the rigid-heddle loom more than a decade ago, these are not the looms you remember.  Advanced manufacturing technology has made more features possible. There is a good loom comparison chart posted in the Rigid Heddle Loom group on Ravelry that was compiled by triplr95 and Stella8523 and updated by Climberknits in October of 2017. This blog post I wrote on beams may also help you think about your loom choice.

A set of cotton and linen towels woven with Mallo Cotton Slub and Duet Cotton/Linen. This rigid heddle pattern uses a pick-up stick and a supplementary weft to create weft floats inspired by the Halvdräll Towels (a 4-shaft pattern) by Arianna Funk.

Warp Length: 4 yards (assumes 26" warp length per towel plus generous loom waste, room for sampling, and about 18% take-up/shrinkage on length and width)*

Note:As written, this project will make four towels and leave you with plenty to make more. If you are working from your stash, assume approximately 100 yards of each yarn per towel woven to these dimensions.

1. Warp the loom using your preferred method (direct or indirect) with a total of 156 warp ends, 4 yards long, alternating 1" sections (12 ends each) of Yarn A and Yarn B. Begin and end with Yarn A, for a total of 13 stripes. Center for a weaving width of 13" and sley 1 end per hole and slot in a 12 dent heddle on a rigid heddle loom.

Place the heddle into the “down” position. Behind the heddle, only the slot threads are up. Place a long piece of cardboard, like a section of manila file folder under the raised threads to help you see which threads to pick up (See photo 1)

Pick 2: heddle is in NEUTRAL, pickup stick slides forward to heddle and turned on its side to create the weft float shed, weave with Yarn A (See photo 4)

**A note on dealing with selvedges: with weft floats, it is important that you cross the wefts at each selvedge edge. Do this by crossing the exiting weft either over or under the previous weft. (See photos 5, 6, 7)

4. Repeat the four picks above nine times, then replace Yarn A with Yarn B and repeat sequence another nine times with the new color. Alternate these blocks of Yarn A and Yarn B until you have woven 11 blocks total (6 of Yarn A, 5 of Yarn B). Towel should measure ~26" in loom under tension. Finish with 2" of tabby using Yarn C. Weave a few picks with contrasting scrap yarn to in between towels, then repeat the above steps to complete 3 additional towels.

5. Cut yardage off the loom and zig zag stitch the edges. Machine wash cold on delicate cycle, tumble dry low and press. Cut towels apart at scrap yarn markers. Hem using your preferred method.

In addition to being Gist"s Operations Manager and Wholesale Director, Christine is a weaver and exhibiting fiber artist. She scampered down the rabbit hole of rigid heddle weaving several years ago as a way to use up her knitting stash and never looked back. In addition to very practical cloth woven to adorn home and body (tea towels are her favorite home linen projects to weave), Christine also weaves conceptual works that explore themes of mood and memory, strength and fragility, and often reflect on the current political and ecological landscape. Her work is held in private collections across the country and is shown regionally in New England galleries. To see more of Christine"s work, check out her Instagram.

They combine three different mechanisms from multi-shaft looms (the reed, the beater, and the heddles) into one piece (the rigid heddle reed). This makes weaving on a rigid heddle loom easy to learn. It also means rigid heddle looms are fast and simple to put a new warp on. You can measure, wind on, and thread a new warp in a couple of hours, compared to the often multi-day set up of floor looms.

Choosing yarns for warping will depend on a few things — the loom you’re working on, how many ends per inch (epi) your project requires and the end use of your textile. All of the warp yarns suggested below can also be used as weft while weaving. We’ve also created this guide to choosing a weft yarn.

A good warp yarn needs to be strong, so that it will not break while under tension on the loom. It also needs to be smooth and without a lot of texture or stretch, especially when working on a rigid heddle loom or floor loom. On a floor loom the warp will be threaded through heddles and the reed, and undergo friction as the cloth is beat down and advanced forward. If the warp yarn has nubs, loops or an uneven texture, it can catch on the reed or break down over time. If a yarn has elastic or is stretchy, it can create tension issues that cause irregularities in your woven textile.

Using a slub yarn for warping bends the requirements of a good warp yarn, in that it has an uneven texture and is not smooth. Some slub yarns are still not suitable for warping, but if they are tightly spun and manufactured with warping in mind, the slub will hold up under friction. We’ve outlined a few of these acceptable yarns below.

If you need to test a yarn to see if it is strong enough for warping, you can snap the yarn hard between two hands and see if it breaks easily. If the yarn does not immediately snap, it should be suitable for warping.

The epi refers to how many individual warp threads land in 1” of your cloth. Ends per inch can also be referred to as the sett, which is determined by the size yarn you’re warping with, and subsequently the size reed you’ll use on the loom. As an example, if you have an epi of 12, you’ll used a 12-dent reed. The higher your epi, the finer your yarn will be — which normally also translates to denser and tighter cloth. A soft and drapey scarf might use 8/4 cotton and have an epi of 12, while a finely woven linen tea towel might have an epi of 24. We make these handy epi counter keychains to help you determine the epi of a warp for various size yarns, but you can also use a ruler. You can see answers to more weaving FAQ’s here.

This project was really popular when I posted it on Instagram, so I thought I would share it here also. It is a simple overshot pattern - with a twist. Also a great way to show off some special yarn. The yarn I used for my pattern was a skein of hand spun camel/silk blend. I wove the fabric on my Jack loom but you could also use your four or eight shaft loom.

Overshot is a weave structure where the weft threads jump over several warp threads at once, a supplementary weft creating patterns over a plain weave base. Overshot gained popularity in the turn of the 19th century (although its origins are a few hundred years earlier than that!). Coverlets (bed covers) were woven in Overshot with a cotton (or linen) plain weave base and a wool supplementary weft for the pattern. The plain weave base gave structure and durability and the woollen pattern thread gave warmth and colour/design. Designs were basic geometric designs that were handed down in families and as it was woven on a four shaft loom the Overshot patterns were accessible to many. In theory if you removed all the pattern threads form your Overshot you would have a structurally sound piece of plain weave fabric.

I was first drawn to Overshot many years ago when I saw what looked to me like "fragments" of Overshot in Sharon Aldermans "Mastering Weave Structures".

I have not included details of number of warp ends, sett and yarn requirements for my project - you can do your calculations based on the sett required for plain weave in the yarn you wish to use.

I wanted to use my handspun - but I only had a 100gms skein, I wanted to maximise the amount of fabric I could get using the 100gms. I thought about all the drafts I could use that would show off the weft and settled on overshot because this showcases the pattern yarn very nicely. I decided to weave it “fragmented” so I could make my handspun yarn go further. I chose a honeysuckle draft.

When doing the treadle tie-up I used 3 and 8 for my plain weave and started weaving from the left, treadle 3 - so you always know which treadle you are up to - shuttle on the left - treadle 3, shuttle on the right treadle 8. I then tied up the pattern on treadles 4,5,6 and 7. You can work in that order by repeating the sequence or you can mix it up and go from 4 to 7 and back to 4 again etc. You will easily see what the pattern is doing.

Wind two shuttles. One with your plain weave base weft and the other with your pattern yarn. You will weave plain weave between each pattern row. The plain weave always goes across the full width. To weave the pattern rows (green on draft below) take the shuttle through the shed and bring it out through the top of the warp, sit it on the warp and then after the next plain weave row take it back into the warp where it came out and back through the shed.

You may remember that I recently returned from a visit to The Philippines. It may not surprise you that I am always on the lookout for interesting textiles, and especially handwoven fabrics. I don’t mean to do that; it just happens… Well, when I met sweet Beth at the Sunday market, I felt like I hit the jackpot! Beth and I had a common language – Handweaving! (She speaks fine English, too, of course; but you know what I mean.)

If you don’t have time to look at all the textile pictures today, at least scroll down and see my little granddaughter carrying her big umbrella on the way to the market. Umbrellas are always in season in Metropolitan Manila. For the rain in the rainy season (our visit), and for shielding your skin from the sun all the rest of the time. (You can always come back later and finish looking at the rest of the pictures. Smile.)