If you made it through my previous post with all of its weaving terminology, I salute you. This is going to be a lot less dense, I promise. As part of the final steps of finishing the rug, we had to secure the warp ends after they were cut from the loom. We ended up tying them into a super cute twisted fringe!

• Fringe twister
• Warp ends

Workshop by Fern at Fern’s School of Craft

When the rug is cut off the loom, the warp is basically floating loose within the over-and-under of the weft. It needs to be secured so that it can’t be tugged out of the finished product, and also so that the compact and beaten in weft doesn’t loosen up. We ended up using a technique called the Damascus Edge. It has two steps to it, with one step working a knot upward, and another step working a knot downward. It does take a little bit of time to work though 164 warp ends on both the top and bottom of the rug, but it’s worth it.

After the knots have been tied, you can technically stop there and rest safe knowing that your weaving is safe, but we decided to push onwards and add a cute fringe. This was done with a tool called a fringe twister, which is pretty aptly named. The clamps each hold on to two strands, and then when the base is spun, the ends will start twisting around each other. I think I spun my fringe for about sixteen turns each.

In my opinion, having the fringe gives the rug more of a finished look. I’m not exactly sure how you would secure the warp on other projects, like cloth for a shirt, or a dishtowel though, so this may be something that I have to look into more if I want to continue with weaving. My best guess is that they would be woven back into the finished product. I kind of like the loose fringe though! Given how much I dislike weaving in loose ends for knitting and crochet, I can’t see it going much better for weaving.

What do you think? Is the twisted fringe worth the additional time, or would you have stopped after the Damascus Edge? Again, Fern was super lovely and gave us a few options when it came to finishing, so I would definitely go back to her if I had more weaving related questions.

Until next time, happy crafting!