Finished Items

I finally got some photos of a couple of items I finished long after the tablet weaving for them was complete, and thought I'd share. They are the Kentish band on metal strips on purple silk, which has been turned into the neck and bicep trim in my new day bliaut, and the "Dogs and Flowers" cingulum.

The cingulum lay unfinished for a long time because I couldn't work out how to finish it. I wanted it to look like the one below, which is one of the figures from Chartres cathedral. The dangly bits are tied loosely in a reef knot and the length of them seems to have many horizontal lines. I haven't managed to find any theories on how exactly this was achieved. Obviously the resulting dangly bits must be quite heavy for the knot to stay open like that.

In the end I just bound the length of the ends in (cheap, synthetic) piping. Obviously the materials are way off, but the look is pretty good I think. The knot stays in place no problem, and the weight also means that the centre of the belt stays nice and high around my waist, which I understand is something some people have problems with.

The bliaut is made of purple wool (looks much bluer in these photos than in reality). It has triangluar sleeves, although you can't see them here.

The lacing method is new to me- it is an attempt to recreate the lacing seen on one of the statues on Angers cathedral, where a spiral laced cord passes through gaps in a cord binding at the side opening. The cord binding is made of lucet cord which has itself been luceted. I don't recommend this; it takes forever.



I intended to make the sides narrow enough that the sides would gape as on the statue, but apparently I am squishier than I thought because the gaps closed completely.