Doreen Jeffers reflects on her experiences in the fibre arts.

Doreen Jeffers reflects on her experiences in the fibre arts.

August 10, 2021

© Kingston Handloom Weavers and Spinners

Shaelagh Cull

Doreen Jeffers

Zoom

I've always been doing something, but not necessarily weaving. I've knit all my life, used to knit on trains and buses going to and from work in England, so I've always been involved somehow. Then when I came here, we saw using a loom at the [Agnes Etherington] Art Center and I was interested, so I put my name down and I took classes. I took evening classes at night school for quite a few years because there was nothing else to do. We had Cora Reid then, she taught weaving, then I took a floor loom course that she gave at the Bath House by Murney Tower there. She gave a weaving course on looms. So I took a course there and that was my, I guess my introduction to proper weaving. I took that and then I joined the Weavers Guild. I've done what I could for the Guild. I've always tried to help. We did classes at the Guild, we got spinning taught there by Dorothy Kirk. She said she would come and teach us the first year of the course. After that I started going classes at Barrie to learn how to spin. I learned a lot on my own. I did quite a lot of weaving and I took all the classes that the Guild gave, which was helpful, but I haven't gone as far as I could have done. I became quite a good spinner. Robin [Ashley] and I, we tried to learn everything we could and if we couldn't learn it, we made it up because there were lots of things you couldn't ask questions about how to spin and what to spin and all the rest of it. But books didn't cover it. Books are okay, once you know how to do it. They can help you refine what you're doing, but they can't teach you how to do it. And I wasn't good at bookwork anyway. But I used to go to Barrie every year for five years and took the class in the summer and I passed that, so that was okay. I did some weaving for DuPont, it would be in the early 90s, I guess. Just fabric that they could rip apart and do things with. I was there to see that they had a fabric strong enough that it would hold. What I could put on the loom, they could go up to North Bay or somewhere and put them on the looms with flying shuttles and manage to make the fabric stay together. That was the main thing, I was there to see that they had a fabric strong enough that it would hold. Some were to put on aeroplanes that they can patch up the holes and put coating over them. So, that was what I did. They wanted woven pieces so they could test them and I wove those. I wove four yards of paper by mistake. I didn't understand. You had a roll of fiber, it was cut up into pieces, but it included the paper, so I assumed they wanted the paper too. So I wove four yards of paper [but] they didn't want that. They wanted the fiber underneath, but that was okay. I didn't do too many, but I did some. They were quite impressed. So was I. It was interesting, it was boring, but that was okay. It was something to do. One of the men was quite impressed that he wanted to hire me for something else that I didn't do it because I made the [news]paper. I've enjoyed the Guild, I liked its company. You get friends you get cliques, you get certain people would go together and others not. You've had all sorts. I've enjoyed weaving on the 100 inch loom, I've enjoyed doing classes. I taught spinning for us 20 years or so, I did the class that teaches spinning to start with. And I've always enjoyed it. I think I encouraged the girls to do different colors because they were doing beige and white and sticking there. Well, I brought a bit of fun to it. It was good.