How to make an Inca Blanket

By: Ayasha MaysPeriod 1

January 7, 2011

Background InfoWeaving was one of the most important crafts of the ancient Incas.

The women did most of the dying, spinning, and weaving of the cloth. However, some men were weavers as well.

Inca used a lot of bright colors on their textiles. The colors to dye the wool were obtained from many sources. They used metals (tins & copper), vegetable dye, shellfish, and insects. The Indigo plant gave off a bright blue dye that was also used.

The Incas had three different types of wool that they used to make clothing and other articles of clothing with the textile. Llama’s wool is very coarse and used to make blankets and ropes. Wool from the alpaca is white with some gray and brown, and used to weave clothing. The wool from the vicuna is a soft fiber used only for the finest cloth.

Materials:

A llama, Alpacas, or vicuñas -backstrap loom-hand spindle-knife-long flat piece of wood-twig without branches

For the dye:-flowers, leaves, fruits (ex. Berries), dye from and indigo plant, or

whatever source you would like to use- Hot water-a silver bowl - A cloth

Vocabulary

Here are some words that you will need to help you once you have begun the weaving steps to understand what pieces of the backstrap loom the step is talking about.

• Weft threads-the threads that go from side-to-side across the loom

• Shed-The gap between the front and back warp threads

• Natural shed- The space where the shed is open above the knife

• Shed stick- Long flat piece of wood

Step 1:

The first step in making this blanket is to decide what type of animal’s wool you want to use. Once that is decided, the next step is to clip the wool from the animal. That was done by using a blade and sliding it across the skin of the animal.

Step 2:

The next step is to tease and organize the wool. This is done by using a weighted stick, called a hand spindle, made out of a stick and a heavy weight at the bottom such as a rock. The wool would be twisted and teased around the stick.

Step 3:

Now the thread is ready. Before weaving the thread, the dye was prepared. The first step in preparing the dye is to wrap the material chosen, in the cloth.

Step 4:

Place the cloth inside the bowl (which has the hot water inside) and let it soak until the water has reached the color you desire.

Step 5:

Now the dye and the thread is ready. Place the thread inside the water and let it soak until the thread has reached the color you want the textile to be.

Step 6:Prepare the backstrap loom for the

weaving. The backstrap loom is just two sticks with a backstrap attached to one side of it, which when around the back of the weaver, and the other side which was attached to a fixed object such as a tree.

Step 7:

Take the thread and loop it from one side of the loom bar to the other side of the loom bar (these pieces of thread are know as the weft thread)six times as shown it the picture below.

Step 8:

Next insert the twig into the warp threads going from one side of the loom to the other and just above where the threads cross in the middle of the loom. Then pull the flat piece of wood down to the bottom of the loom.

Step 9:

Take another piece of thread and pass it through the shed from right to left leaving a tail of thread sticking out on the right. The thread will fall down to where the twig is.

Step 10:

Now, take the shed stick and weave it in and out of the warp threads, going under the lower threads and over the top ones. With one hand on either end of the shed stick, twist it so that it opens a new shed. Pass your thread through this shed from left to right, like pictured below.

Step 11:Now flatten the shed stick again

and pull it out of the loom. The piece of thread placed in step 10 should be on the right side. You should now have a natural shed again and you can pass another piece of thread from the right to the left. Continue repeating the same step as before with the shed stick.

Step 12:

Continue with the same steps as before until your blanket is 52 inches wide and 60 inches long. CONGRATULATIONS YOU HAVE JUST MADE A TRADITIONAL INCA BLANKET!!

Bibliographyhttp://books.google.com/books?id=ZI1LIpuyJPkC&pg=PA20&lpg=PA20&dq=how+the+inca+make+dye+from+plants&source=bl&ots=BXJk9OQ86s&sig=IUlMIvSThh2VMnz0WQszaaMeaRQ&hl=en&ei=CoYjTd2UGoy28QPFyK3cBQ&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=3&ved=0CCcQ6AEwAg#v=onepage&q=how%20the%20inca%20make%20dye%20from%20plants&f=false

http://www.mgmoa.org/sites/mg/uploads/documents/Education/StartwithArt/Inca_Textiles/SWA-Andean_Dreamers.pdf

http://www.weavezine.com/content/backstrap-basicshttp://www.pioneerthinking.com/naturaldyes.html