Four and Eight Shaft Twills II

Marcy Petrini

June 13, 2016 

Last week (6-June-16 Blog) I compared undulating twills on 4 and 8-shafts, which I am including in my Convergence™ monograph; this week we’ll compare advancing twills. 

Here is the drawdown for an advancing straight twill on four shafts.  (Right-click on these drafts to get a larger version in a new window.)

The fabric is woven tromp as writ, so both of threading and the treadling are a bit complex. The repeat starts with a complete straight twill, but it doesn’t have to. 

If we use a pointed twill as the starting point for the advancing, the treadling can be a straight draw as shown in the next drawdown. 

The fabric for this twill doesn’t show the pattern very well, but the motif contributes to the complex way in which the light is reflected because the floats change direction repeatedly. 

  The next advancing twill is on eight shafts. From the drawdown, note that the threading is that of a straight twill and the advancing occurs in the treadling which is based on a pointed twill. Of course the advancing could be done on the threading as well. The eight shafts make it possible for the zig zag to be doubled with the floats interrupted by the warp.  

The resulting fabric below shows the same characteristic mentioned for the four shaft twill, the light reflects as the floats change direction. 

Whether on four or eight shafts, these twills have a level of complexity that results in interesting fabrics.  

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