Japanese Paper

I have the warps for the multiple cloth wound on to the warp beams and am threading up which is a big job. The piece of silk I wove last had 1450 threads and a complicated threading on 32 shafts. This one has 1600 threads, a simple threading - 40 times 1 to 8, followed by 40 times 9 to 16 and repeat. BUT, because of the multiple warps, one is always looking for the correct next thread. The other point is that afternoon threading is clearly much better. Light is pouring onto the Megado whereas the warp will all be in shadow this evening.

Yesterday I went bookbinding and found that a man from J Hewit of Edinburgh was present at the class with leather to sell not to mention marbled paper and, to my joy, Japanese paper. I have been reading lists of Japanese paper for the last few months but it is pricey and I thought I would like to see samples before buying. And he had six sorts! I bought a sheet each of five sorts. One was far too flimsy at 10gsm. The rest were 20 to 29gsm so they were all very fragile. They have got Japanese names which probably mean something.  One of them (Maruishi) is made from hemp and the rest from wood pulp.

The Coptic binding is ready to be sewn. The covers are made and holes made in the paper. I am looking forward to this. Just as well something interesting is going on because I still have not succeeded in pasting the Omar Khayyam end-papers to a backing sheet without wrinkles and/or smudges. I found my flour paste had gone off in the fridge so cooked up some more this afternoon and tried again.

Back to a bit more threading up