This is why we can't have nice things

Does anyone else collect careers they think they might have enjoyed if only they had known about them when such decisions need to be made? I have a running list that I keep adding to, with my most recent addition of experimental archeologist. This was because I was listening to a podcast where Sally Pointer was being interviewed. I've been aware of Ms. Pointer for a while, but this was the first interview I had listened to. 

One of her areas of interest and experimentation is bast fibers, of which the flax plant is one. Linen comes from the inside fibers of the flax plant and it is quite an involved process to go from the plant to a spinnable fiber. (Thank you to everyone who sent me the link to the YouTube channel about the woman documenting her journey of growing flax with the end goal of sewing a linen dress.) The fiber from the flax plant is the long and strong fibers found inside the stem. The process involves getting (really controlled rotting) the outside vegetable matter, scrapping out the usable fiber, and then using hackles to open up the fiber to a spinnable stare. 

Linen is incredibly strong, becomes stronger when wet, and the fabric made from good linen becomes softer and softer over time. It also lasts a very long time. When textiles were rarer, bed linens were often seen listed in people's wills. There are still linen labourer's shirts which are extant from over a hundred years ago. Beautiful fabric which lasts a very long time... what's not to like? 

Well, there is a lot not to like if your goal is disposability in order to sell more stuff. Linen bed linens would be the opposite of that. I've been thinking about linen a lot recently because I have battling the warp from hell on my loom. I had bought some very on sale 50/50 cotton/linen fiber and this was what I was going to weave the guest towels for the holiday market with. It was all going well until it very much wasn't. 

You know that niggling voice in the back of your head saying perhaps this isn't a good idea? Well, I had that little voice from the start of the project. But it was linen, linen is really strong, what could go wrong? 

I can't even begin to describe in how many ways it all went wrong. Well, I could, actually, but I'm 100% sure you don't want to read it. I had to purchase new yarn and almost start from scratch. It was not fun and I was definitely kicking myself. But still there was the thought that I should have been able to trust the linen. 

This is where Sally Pointer comes into this whole saga. In the interview I listened to she mentioned that not only is flax not processed nearly as much as in the past, but it is also processed differently. Instead of spinning the fiber intact which creates line linen, which is very strong, many mills will cotton the fiber. This means that the flax is chopped up into shorter bits like cotton which is a short stapler fiber. Modern linen fabric made with cottoned flax is not going to last nearly as long as line linen. I'm sure the fiber I was trying to weave with had been spun with cottoned fiber. 

So companies, have gone out of their way to take a durable, beautiful, and useful fiber and turn it into a more disposable commodity. It actually makes me angry and not just because I've spent two weeks paying for a bad warping decision. I'm feeling a little compelled to buy some line linen yarn and weave my own bed linens. Imagine not having to replace them!

And a couple of pictures for getting this far. First, the sort of towel I was able to eek out in order to get my holiday market application in. This has been washed so the lace pattern is easier to see.

Here is the new warp which is going to actually work. The green isn't quite what it looks like in person. It is closer to an emerald green as opposed to whatever this is. I couldn't match the color with the better yarn.