Virtual Open Studio

Ideal breakfast nook

I came downstairs on Saturday morning to discover this beautiful vase of lilacs on the table. Our neighbor, Laura Morris, an avid and professional gardener/florist, put them there. They made this corner of display the ideal breakfast nook. I was too busy to sit and enjoy it myself. 81 people signed the guest book this weekend, but I think a few slipped in and out without signing. There was work shown on three floors, and each floor had a "host." Holly Walker greeted people on the first floor, my husband, Mark Goodwin, was on the second floor, and I was on the third floor demonstrating the TC-1 loom. I created a slideshow of the weekend (a Virtual Open Studio) on my Picasa site and if you want to see it, click HERE.

Map of First Floor Work, minus the labels

I made maps of each floor of the house, and labelled the art work and listed information such as size, date, materials, and price. I think only a handful of people noticed them, and maybe people didn't realize the work was for sale. I know our friends who visited from Utica weren't sure, and so I tried to place the maps in more prominent places on Sunday, but they still seemed to be invisible. Maybe our work was so brilliant the visitors didn't notice anything else. I prefer thinking that than entertaining the thought that nobody liked the work. Personally, I thought everything looked great.

Connie, Patty, Jane and Andy (left to right), four of the 81 visitors during the Open Studio Weekend (Jane and Andy are weavers themselves)

For the weaving demonstration, I had my Macintosh computer where I do my Photoshop work set up next to the PC which runs my TC-1 loom. Using the processes described in The Woven Pixel (yes, I did have a copy of the book out for visitors to see), I had four files open to show my guests--the original digital image of an Ottomon tile which I took in Turkey a number of years ago; the design file which had the tile reduced to three colors and a layer of descriptive words on top (something like "this is a demo during Vermont Open Studios by BZ in her beautiful Randolph studio with visitors watching"); the layered weave file where I could click pattern on and off to show people how pattern is placed over color; and the final bmp file which is brought to the PC computer. You can see these four files in the slideshow. I usually wove about ten picks each time I showed people how the loom worked, but it added up to a significant amount of weaving. You can see in the image below how much was woven, start and stop all the way, this weekend.

Demonstration weaving at the end of the Open Studio Sunday evening

Saturday afternoon I finally had a break and ran downstairs to offer Holly lunch. We both got bowls of yogurt, fruit and granola and sat out front. We were stunned to discover it was almost 5pm, and the lull was because Open Studio stopped at 5. Both days were busy, though Sunday morning started slow, with rain, but then became a glorious day and we had a steady stream of visitors. It was very exciting to have so many people interested in weaving. I even had a few visitors weave on the macomber loom I had set up in case anyone wanted to try.

Demonstration weaving finished today

This morning was another beautiful day in Vermont, so we took our dog for a ride and went to the book and plant sale in Tunbridge. We didn't get anything, but it was fun to walk down the street which was packed with people greeting one another. It was like that in our house this weekend too--it seemed like all our visitors knew one another, and perhaps in a few years we will know everyone in Randolph too. When we got home I went upstairs and finished the weaving. No visitors watching today.

Pictures of House and Studio

This is the house! Of course right now the ground and roof are covered with snow. But spring is right around the corner and we hope to add herbs to the beautiful perennials already there. 

Last Spring, before we moved here, I did a series of weavings of the house on my TC-1 loom. They all used a 20/2 tencel warp set at 60 epi. This weaving was done in weft-backed structures of satin and twill bases using three wefts. I imposed a road map of the Randolph area on top of the image of the house, then converted the roads to phrases.

Three views of the studio. There are five looms up there--three Macomber shaft looms, one 24-shaft Louet Magic Dobby, and my TC-1--queen of them all.

By the way, Carol Westfall and Trish Fowler wrote a very nice article on my work in the summer issue of Shuttle, Spindle & Dyepot. Also The Herald, the local Randolph newspaper, ran an article on Mark and I moving to town. If you click on The Herald in previous line you can read the whole article. The author, Stephen Morris, who is editor of The Green Living Journal, was the publisher of the straw bale book we referenced when we built our house in New Mexico. Randolph is full of "small world" connections.

A New Studio

Maybe I am an urban nomad. I have lived in New York City apartments, mud huts with no amenities in Guatemala and Mexico, small cottages in Kansas, the dark basement of a lakeside manor in Michigan, a factory converted to an artists' cooperative in Philadelphia, a solar straw-bale house in New Mexico, and a bland track building in Tempe, Arizona. The list is not complete. My most recent move was to a beautiful spacious Victorian built in 1900 in Randolph, Vermont. February 14th we (my husband and I) will celebrate one year of ownership, though we didn't actually move into the house until September first.

After settling five of my looms into two rooms on the second floor, my husband suggested we switch spaces and move his studio into those rooms, and my looms to the finished third floor attic that he had been using. What seemed like an easy request turned into a lot of work for him. I pulled up the carpet and he laid a pine board floor. He also removed some walls and plastered and painted the room. Last week we moved the looms upstairs, along with my yarn and other weaving tools. It is a beautiful space, with good light from windows and sky lights. It is the kind of space that draws me to it. It feels good to be there.

So now the question is, when I am going to start to weave? Of course I have the real excuse that I have to do my taxes first. And then there is the preparation for the party on the 14th to celebrate this move. And since we joined the gym at the local college, I have to go to water aerobics three mornings a week....And of course, now I have this blog to write!

This is my first post. I don't expect to actually write here daily, maybe weekly will do. I have lots of plans for the studio and will share the journey, inviting you to join me upstairs.