Strips of sap-free cedar bark in the foreground - students braving an adventure of spinning Chilkat warp!
Sunday night, a few hours after the tail end of the 1st Annual Yakutat Tern Festival, 18 women began to learn the art of spinning Chilkat warp of yellow cedar bark and merino wool. Traditionally, we use mountain goat wool, however, mountain goat wool is a rare find these days and merino wool is the closest fiber to match that of the mountain goat. The class began at 6pm and was only supposed to be 2 hours, but we didn’t get out of the classroom until 11:30pm that night when Evelyn finally broke the spell and said: “Gee, I’ve got to go home now…” Suddenly, all of us realized it was way past our bedtime! That’s what happens when we’re having too much fun!
A class of 18 students making their first attempts at spinning Chilkat warp - L to R: Carol Pate, MaryAnn Porter, Angel Harry, Evelyn Dierick, Carolyn Donohue, Eva Sensmeier, Victoria Demmert, Lois Dworshak, Yvonne Baker, ,Anne Pollnow, Shirley Cain, Joy Klushkan, (Maka Monture & Alison Bremner obscured), Judy Ramos, Penney James, and Gloria Benson
Some of the students are weavers of Ravenstail learned from Cheryl Samuels who revived the art of Ravenstail weaving back in the late 80’s. Ravenstail warp is not spun with cedar bark; Chilkat warp is. Someday, these students want to learn the art of Chilkat weaving, and with the eagerness of learning how to spin their own warp, I can tell these women will be persistent about learning Chilkat weaving.
Thin strips of yellow cedar bark ready to spin with the wool - silky when wet, rough when dry
L to R: Joy Klushkan, Maka Monture, Alison Bremner, Judy Ramos
The youngest student in the class, Angel Harry, organizes her strips of cedar bark and her wool roving to prepare for the next step - the actual spinning on her thigh!
Many thanks to MaryAnn Porter who helped organize this event and brought the class members together, to Carol Pate for the use of her Home Economics classroom and to all the students who braved the adventure of spinning Chilkat warp!