Category Archives: Announcements

Blacksheep 2023 Towel Exchange!

Announcements, Towel Exchange

Blacksheep 2023 Towel Exchange!

We are excited to announce the guidelines for our 2023 towel exchange and look forward to seeing all your beautiful contributions at our June Guild Meeting or alternatively at CNCH in August!

Guidelines for the Blacksheep towel exchange 2023:

Participation: Any member of the Black Sheep Guild can participate in the towel exchange

Due dates: we will collect all participating towels before our June 2023 meeting on June 15

Submission: You can bring your towels to the June 2023 meeting (if we are holding the meeting in person) , drop it off in South San Jose or or send it via mail

Distribution: We are planning to showcase and distribute your towels at the 2023 CNCH in San Luis Obispo. If you cannot participate, we would be happy to send your towels home with a friend or colleague. 

Specifications: Towels must be woven from cotton, linen, hemp, or any combination of these fibers. Finished size is to be between 18” and 22″ inches wide, and 25” to 28″ long. 

Please plan ahead to address shrinkage and pull-in. Please finish with a hem, either hand-sewn or machine-sewn.

Closer to the due date, we’ll provide you a form to fill out for each towel asking for information on you and your towels, including loom, draft, yarn info, inspiration, etc.

Hang onto your finished towels until the June 2023 meeting; we’ll collect them at the meeting, or if we’re unable to meet, we’ll tell you where to mail your towels. 

When you turn in your towels, we’ll be asking you to tell us your color preference: warm colors, cool colors, neutrals or potluck.  We’ll do our best to honor your preferences.

You’ll get three towels from three different Black Sheep weavers at the 2023 CNCH meeting in early August. If you are unable to attend CNCH this year,, we’ll arrange another way to get your towels to you.

Want to get back more than 3 towels? Go ahead and turn in more! Please make them in multiples of 3.

You turn in 3 towels, you get 3 towels back. We are only accepting multiples of 3 towels

Questions? Contact 2023 Towel Exchange coordinators: 

Stefanie Selck (sselck [at] gmail [dot] com)

Barbie Paulsen (weaverbarbie [at] gmail [dot] com)

 

Barbara Shapiro Introduces the New World Shibori Network Foundation

Announcements

Barbara Shapiro Introduces the New World Shibori Network Foundation

Artist, author, scholar, and friend Yoshiko Wada has presented several times at Black Sheep
meetings. In1975, she taught the first Shibori class in the US. In the 1990s Wada and Japanese colleagues held the First International Shibori Symposium (ISS) in Nagoya, Japan, seeking to promote shibori textiles in Japan and beyond by preserving this century-old technique from disappearing. The World Shibori Network (WSN) aims to share information and inspiration and to preserve Japanese shibori and similar heritage techniques across the globe by creating a bridge between the ancient and the contemporary in textile technologies with an emphasis on sustainability. In 2022, WSN became a non-profit foundation.
Slow Fiber Studios (SFS) https://shibori.org/slow-fiber-studios/ is now the official
educational arm of WSN and will continue to offer in-person and online lectures and workshops on a variety of textile subjects. The Shop https://shop.slowfiberstudios.com/ offers excellent sustainable indigo and other dyes, Shibori tools and products, and a range of pertinent books and videos, etc. Newly developed Slow Fiber TV https://shibori.org/slow-fiber-tv/ offers subscription-based access to uncut versions of the various SFS workshops and other content.
Trips and tours https://shibori.org/international-tours/ are in the planning stages. Join our
mailing list for updates on our programs and consider become a member of WSN
https://shibori.org/membership/. Full disclosure, I am a founding board member of the new WSN Foundation.

— Barbara Shapiro