Cotton and silk

I really like the idea of weaving cotton, but I'm routinely disappointed by the reality. Either it's fine cotton and ends up solid, or it's spongy cotton and ends up coarse and strange. I am going to keep going though, because I am a Weaving Scientist! No, actually, because I have overbought lots of cotton from Ice and have to use it up. Before I will let myself buy more.

This was the starting point, a very pretty variegated 100% cotton. In lovely shades of pink. 

I knew that I wanted to mix it up with something a bit different, so I went down to the Crafty Frog and found this cotton silk blend. It is 78% cotton and 22% silk, and is a little bit bumpy. Is that a technical term? Maybe nobbly.

And this is the end result. I am getting so desperate for places to try and photograph my scarves that I am draping them on the laundry hamper! Not great. I put the variegated cotton on the warp and the bumpy cotton silk blend on the weft. It was beautiful to weave - smooth and clean and lovely to touch. You can see that the variegation on the warp made a strip effect.

And this is the close up. It's nice - certainly nicer than some of my other cotton disasters - but it still doesn't work as well in a scarf as wool. There's just not the drape and softness. I will experiment more!