Roberta McKinney reminisces about creating the Beyond Beginners weaving workshop with Elly Hoogendorn.

Roberta McKinney reminisces about creating the Beyond Beginners weaving workshop with Elly Hoogendorn.

June 22, 2021

© Kingston Handloom Weavers and Spinners

Shaelagh Cull

Roberta McKinney

Tett Centre for Creativity and Learning

The main workshops I've led have been ones for beginning weavers and we started, another lady and I, started doing those in about 2002 and we discontinued, probably the fall of 2018. But we led probably one, two, sometimes even three workshops a year, just for people that wanted to learn to weave. And that was most gratifying. I've also given a couple of other workshops, one on weaving crackle, which is a weave structure, one on weaving with chenille and then we started a workshop for people who had taken the beginning weaving class and just needed more direction, so it was called Beyond Beginner. And from that, that led to organizing a study group for beginning weavers and we have been doing that until COVID hit for probably the last three or four years. And that's been wonderful. The workshops are fairly small, we use equipment that the guild has in its, in the room. So we're limited to a maximum of seven people. And you can get around and talk to people and see what they're doing and when they finish a project, their first project on the loom, there's nothing that gives me more pleasure than seeing the light in their eyes and knowing that they're a weaver now. I think that's been one of the most gratifying parts of becoming a weaver is watching new people learn to weave. Beginning weaving workshops have been something this Guild has been very proud to be able to offer to anyone that wants to learn to weave. As I say the numbers have to be limited because of the equipment we have and that's why we often had two or maybe three workshops a year just to get people through. But it's a chance for people to find out what weaving is about without the cost of purchasing all the equipment, because the loom is just the beginning and it's not a cheap piece of equipment either. So there's all the little bits and pieces to go and if you know that it's something that you're going to enjoy, then you're a lot more willing to go out and actually put out the money to get the equipment that you're going to need. So that's a big part of it. And but what I've also found is that they can take the beginning course the way it's set up here with this Guild, it usually starts Friday night, it's all day, Saturday, all day Sunday, it's a very intensive course, to try to get a project on the loom and off the loom in a weekend. So often people are working so hard by the time they finish on Sunday, you can okay, but could I do this again, and they're not sure, which is why we have gone and had the second workshop. And the other thing that developed out of that, and again, this is something just to keep Weaver's interest brand new weavers interested in weaving, we started a study group, and they could talk about whatever they wanted, they could suggest things that they wanted to learn and we would do the research and find out how they could do it. But it meant that if we picked a topic, then everybody in the study group had to do something on that project. So they're all learning at the same time and often one weave structure will lead to another one to another one to another one and you can incorporate a lot of different ideas. And it's interesting, you give 10 people one particular project to do and you've got 10 totally different ways of interpreting that project, which is, which is great to see. But I think the other thing for me, the the woman that helped in these workshops was she's older than I am, a great lady, and she volunteered to help me and she was there. She kept track of all the ladies, she would talk to them and keep them interested. Everybody remembered Ellie, everybody, if I meet a student on the on the streets outside somewhere, how's Ellie doing? So she was the one that they really remembered not me who told them what they should be doing and how they should be doing it. But Ellie was always there to encourage them and support what they were doing. So it's been, over the last 15 to 17 years, it was a wonderful experience. And again, I think teaching new people, something that you're passionate about and seeing the excitement that they get, can be one of the most rewarding things that that you can ever do.