WGRI Programs 2023-2024
Submitted by Jaimee Roberts
Vice President, WGRI
September 8th, 2023 at 6pm
Location: Rhode Island Weaving Center
334 Main St, Wakefield, RI Suite 200
***Please note this meeting will be at a different time and location than our usual meetings!***
Our Journey with the Loom with Lynda Teller Pete
A discussion with 5th generation Navajo weaver, Lynda Teller Pete. An opportunity to look at the work done by the weavers enrolled in her workshop.
October 14th, 2023 at 9:30am
Location: New Hope Chapel
80 Richmond Townhouse Rd, Carolina
***Please note this meeting will be at a different time and location than our usual meetings!***
Reed Making with Jim Wilson
Jim Wilson, owner of Rhode Island’s own Gowdey Reed, in conversation with Norma Smayda. Please think of questions for our guest.
Show & Tell- Our September meeting will not have a show and tell, so please bring all of your recent projects to our October meeting.
November 4th, 2023 at 9:30am
Location: North Kingstown Library
100 Boone St, North Kingstown, RI
A Weaver's Journey in Textiles with Donna LaVallee
A show and tell and slide show with of weaving and wandering through textiles and museums with our new WGRI President, Donna LaVallee.
Donna LaVallee has been weaving for 39 years. She is a color and texture weaver, loving to experiment with yarns, fibers, and textures. She could be happy with just 4 harnesses forever. She also decided to pursue a career in Textile Conservation in the late 1990s from the University of Rhode Island. This added wonderful experiences as an intern at the Cooper-Hewitt National Design Museum in NYC and at the Textile Conservation Workshop in Salem, New York. She worked on the Joseph and Annie Albers exhibition at the Cooper-Hewitt. Then her husband took her off to San Francisco and she worked occasionally with the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco and as the Collections Manager at The Lace Museum in Sunnyvale, California. She served as the Workshop and Tour Coordinator for the Textile Arts Council of the FAMSF. Through all of this, she continued to weave and to embroider. Lately she has been making books, especially miniature books - under 3" x 3".
December 2nd, 2023 at 9:30am
Location: North Kingstown Library
100 Boone St, North Kingstown, RI
Fragment Festivity
We’ll celebrate the holidays with warm drinks, cookies, and small gifts made from your weaving fragments. More details to come!
January 6th, 2024 at 9:30am
Location: Zoom
Introduction to Supplemental Warps
with Deb Essen
What are Supplemental Warps? This power point presentation (with lots of pictures) is an introduction to what supplemental warps are and how you can use them in your weaving.
Deb Essen lives, weaves, and runs her business dje handwovens in the Bitterroot Valley, nestled in the Rocky Mountains of western Montana. In 2004, Deb achieved the Certificate of Excellence in Handweaving-Level 1 through the Handweaver’s Guild of America. In 2011 she was inducted to the Montana Circle of American Masters in Folk and Traditional Art. Her book, Easy Weaving With Supplemental Warps, was published originally by Interweave Press in 2016. In 2022, the book was re-released as an expanded revised edition, with more projects and weave structures, by Schiffer Publishing. She has recorded five weaving videos, available through Long Thread Media, ranging from supplemental warps to profile drafting and has written multiple feature articles for Handwoven and Little Looms magazines. Deb is passionate about teaching about the wonders of weaving and teaches at shops, guilds, regional and national conferences and festivals.
February 7th, 2024 at 7pm
***Wednesday Night***
Location: Zoom
Sharing The Stories Of Gist Yarn
with Sarah Resnick
I’ll be sharing stories from my weaving yarn company Gist Yarn, which I opened in 2017. I’ll start with sharing a bit of my experience working in cut-and-sew garment manufacturing, and what prompted me to take the leap over to star ng a yarn business focused on domestic textile production. Then I will share how our company has grown and evolved through the years, including how we partner with textile mills to create new lines of yarn for weavers, and how we work with emerging and experienced designers to create and publish new weaving patterns.
Sarah Resnick founded the weaving yarn company Gist Yarn in 2017. She manages the finances, works to keep the Gist Yarn team happy and thriving, and builds partnerships with mills and dyehouses to bring new lines of yarn to life.
Sarah learned to weave in Toronto in 2009, and has been fascinated with the colors and textures that roll off of her loom ever since. She started her career as a community and union organizer, and made the switch to small business when she helped to launch a sewing factory in Massachusetts 2016. Sarah also designs a line of printed and woven Jewish ritual textiles, which she sells through her business Advah Designs.
March 2nd, 2024 at 9:30am
Location: North Kingstown Library
100 Boone St, North Kingstown, RI
It's Not All About the Unicorn
with Linda Rhynard
Contemporary Tapestry weaving has taken many creative paths. Building upon but migrating away from traditional works, Tapestry artists are being inspired by revolutionary fiber artists of the 50's,60's and 70's. My presentation will show works of those early artists along with the works of currents artists, some who are local.
Additionally, I will be offering a brief hands- on experience with manipulated warp techniques, using small stretcher frame looms. Linda Rhynard is owner of Kindred Spirits Creations- a studio dedicated to teaching Weaving in Bristol, RI. Linda has been passionately engaged in Fiber Arts for the last 20+years and is a Certified Weaving a Life instructor, has taken extensive workshops at Harrisville Design Studio, John C
Campbell Folk art School, The Weaving Studio with Marilyn van der Hoogt, Tapestry Classes with Janet Austin, Susan Martin Maffei (ATA 2014) Workshops: Tamar Shadur, Northampton Mass., Color and Design Workshop with Rebecca Mezoff, Navajo Weaving classes through Weaving in Beauty in Gallup N.M (Gloria Begay and Jenny Slick) and multiple classes with Lynda Teller Pete and Barbara Teller Ornelas.
Linda’s work has been exhibited in several juried shows both locally and nationally. She was also a contributor the UMass Dartmouth Exhibit “Contemporary Textiles reflecting Abolition, Slavery and the Road North"(Spring 2017). She has also been included in several ATA Exhibit Publications.
April 6th, 2024
Location: North Kingstown Library
100 Boone St, North Kingstown, RI
Painting Warps on Two Continents with Sarah Saulson
In this presentation Sarah will examine the beauty and design potentials of painting warps on loom, as she focuses on her own work with the technique over many years, and the guild's workshop over the previous 2 days. We’ll also have an opportunity to see traditional Mayan handweavers learn the same technique using back-strap looms, with stunning results.
Sarah Saulson has been weaving since she was 8 years old. For many years, she taught weaving in the School of Art at Syracuse University. She and her husband are now happliy living in Providence. Sarah is thrilled to now teach weaving at the Rhode Island Weaving Center in Wakefield. She also maintains her own weaving studio at Hope Artiste Village in Pawtucket, where she focuses on weaving heirloom quality Jewish Prayer
Shawls on commission. She is proud to be a member of the Rhode Island Weavers Guild.
May 4th, 2024
Location: WovenSeas Weaving Studio
569 Main St. Suite 106
Warren, RI 02885
WovenSeas Studio Tour with Elizabeth Springett
Welcome to WovenSeas Weaving studio, where threads come to life and the art of weaving unfolds in a symphony of color and texture. Step into our studio humming with over 16 looms of 6 different models bathed in wonderful daylight. Explore our gallery of handcrafted masterpieces and shop our store. We offer the complete Gist Yarn line, some Webs linen and cotton yarns along with our new exclusive WovenSeas patterns. Elizabeth will give a short introduction and recap of her life in textiles.
Elizabeth obtained a BFA in Textile Design from Southeastern Massachusetts University. She began her career designing apparel fabrics in New York City then transitioned into home fabric fashion design, traveling the world shopping for fabrics and colors trends to inspire decorators and interior designers. In 2016 she opened her own weaving studio.
WovenSeas Weaving Studio is located in Warren, RI where Elizabeth shares her knowledge of weaving and creates hand woven cloth.