
I thought and mulled and hesitated and looked and faltered for a long long time before settling on my principle loom. I bought an 80cm Ashford table loom initially, which I still have and use, before deciding to also get a full floor loom as my main workhorse.

A floor loom in a boat is tricky for space and initially the Ashford Jackloom was going to be my choice for the ease of folding it away, but in the end I decided I wanted the loom to be a permanent feature, both in the boat and in my life. Aesthetically I really liked the Gilmakra floor looms, but every version of these was too large a footprint for my space.

After reading many hours worth of reviews I settled on the Louet Spring II countermarche with 12 shafts, made in Holland, and as a compromise for space I selected a 90cm weaving width rather than the 110cm. From what I could tell, it is simply the best handloom on the market that remains uncomputerized. I particularly wanted a countermarche loom, a system where the shed (space where the shuttle slides through) is created by the threads being lifted both up and down and therefore the tension remains uniform. Most other systems some threads remain static and the other threads rise to create the shed, meaning an uneven tension while working.

Ordered from Saber Fazer in Portugal and after multiple failed deliveries and terrible communication by UPS I ended up needing to collect it from an industrial zone in Narbonne… on my electric bike, and cycle it as best I could along the canal for 20km back to my boat in the countryside. This was a UPS fault, not Saber Fazer, who are excellent. But, dragging it back, I had the presentiment that this was one of the most important things I’d ever acquired in my life and would be with me forever.

It took me quite a few days to figure out how to construct it, being ever so gentle not to scratch or break anything. The online videos from Louet really helped, much more than the paper manual. A gentle old man talking me through heddles, treadles, lamms, and everything from old recordings. The castle (top box full of pulleys, springs and cords) comes prebuilt, which is a blessing as it looks complex. I’d decided on a different bench from the standard weaving ones.

The theory of tie up is quite straight forward, although on 14 treadles I found the difficulty is in little errors creeping in. This is true in weaving generally, and the slow, steady, do, check, check, do, check, check, do, check, check, check is the best way. As well as the humbling rule of thumb that if a mistake is spotted, go back and correct it, always, even if it means undoing hours of work, otherwise the whole project becomes ruined.
Two advantages to the Spring II loom that I think places it above all others are –
The silence, with no metal and wood clanking and banging. The pulley operation is so smooth it is like an owl on the hunt.
The floating breast beam that shows you the tension so visually that it is easy to keep it uniform throughout a project. When there is slack in the system the breast beam lever tilts back towards the castle. To reach perfect tension simply crank it to be parallel with the leg. If it tilts away from the castle then you have too much tension, release the crank and allow in some slack. It becomes a good way to intuitively teach you what is a good tension so that eventually you can tell by a finger touch on the cloth without looking at the beam. Anyway, I think it is a great tool.

I like to personalise things, in fact I can’t resist, so the loom has been given different brake and beater handles, made from local branches. A wooden worktop with an ashford raddle screwed to hold my yarns on has been placed on top the castle, and I’ll probably replace or adjust many other bits as the years go by. I use Toika temples and Gilmakra boat shuttles, and I love the shuttles but might experiment with some other temples.
I love weaving, it brings me so much peace and joy, with creativity and careful, complex design thrown in. So many skills to learn. I call it my little yarn piano, creating music with threads... and because it looks like a piano. I think my only regret was not buying the 110cm model and making room for it, nevermind.

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