Fashionable Woven Belts 2

Sash Belts

I saw a fashion article earlier this year with an illustration of a lovely sash belt.

Close up of sash belt

Here is another sash I saw in a shop window.

I remembered that I had bought a Peruvian sash belt many years ago.

Peruvian sash in warp faced plain weave. 

It is  163 cm  in length and 7.5 cm( 3 inches) in width.
Here is a close up of the material.  It is in warp faced plain weave and uses very fine cotton.

Close up of sash belt from Peru

Of course, sash belts are part of the folk costume in many countries. They are made using many different techniques; finger weaving, tablet weaving, sprang as well as patterned band weaving.

Norwegian belts

Russian belt

Sash from Guatalmala.

Assumption sash, Canada.

Here is another traditional Ukrainian Belt, called krajka, handmade using the old traditional weaving loom in Western Ukraine. There are some lovely designs shown in the Etsy shop WovenSlavicBelts.

Ukrainian woven sash

Weaving a warp faced plain weave sash.

Sash belts are easy to weave and wear.  I thought that I would try to weave my own sash as I love stripes and warp faced plain weave is such an easy structure. I was not sure of the sett for 16/2 Swedish cotton.  I decided to use a high sett and weave a short sample.

I used three colours of red, white and blue, with a darker blue for the border.  I used a 14 dent reed with 6 ends per dent.  Weft is white 16/2 cotton.

Sett at 84 per inch

width 3.75 inches / 9.5 cm     =       324   ends

Dark Blue 30
Mid Blue              1       25               1
White            41                       18
Red                          25        1                 Centre  40 red  then reverse the colour order.

Belt on the loom

It was easier to weave than I thought it would be. The Swedish cotton is good quality and strong.

close up on loom showing dotted edging to the solid colour areas

I tried using a dark navy weft so that the edges of the band would be a solid colour. This made the white stripe darker so I switched to using a white weft.  This was better and did not show up in the red and blue striped areas.  It makes a white dotted edge to the belt which echos the dotted edges of red and blue.

Here is the finished belt. It is 9.5 cm in width which I feel is slightly too wide. The feel of the woven material is smooth and flexible.  The cotton has a slight sheen.  The colour is more natural than on the close up on the loom. Artificial lighting alters colour values.

This is the finished belt. 

I am not sure I will wear this as a belt.  The material is lovely to handle and I thought that I could make a small bag with it.

It was a good learning exercise.  I now know the sett for weaving warp faced wider bands and the type of material that 16/2 cotton produces.

Happy weaving

Susan J Foulkes  September 2017