Less is ... Fine

When I wove this blanket I wanted to place the five beautiful greens and blues consecutively in big diamonds. Normally I would add narrow lines of an accent colour between, as Cariboo Handwoven followers may know by now I like to do.

I had the five shades lined up and they looked beautiful together. In big diamonds of what I call rough and smooth twill on a warp of wide grey stripes, this would look very well for a blanket that would have a certain soft boldness to it with the heathery tones. I just needed to choose an accent colour for narrow lines between the colours.

I had a lighter shade of green ... no, too green.
A lighter shades of blue? ... nope, too blue.
Use the light grey from the warp stripes? ... too grey and bland.
A lighter shade then, say, of a heathery beige? Still too bland.

Oh, I know. If in doubt use white. So I wove the first narrow stripe after the first big diamond in white, actually a beautiful cream.

But that was way too bright and sterile, it just didn't work. I unwove all the white.

My solution? No narrow lines between the five shades of heathery greens and blues. Just let the colours mix together, transition in big diamonds from one shade to the next.

SH200 | 100% wool | 187 cm x 130 cm (73.5" x 51") | Private Collection

Problem solved. Less is fine a lot of the time.