Locks in Spinning and Plying

I’ve been teaching some mini-workshops at my house this winter.  These are 1-2 hour sessions where I focus on one or maybe two main topics.  I also use these sessions to work out new ideas for workshops…..the folks who take these workshops are, after a fashion, my guinea pigs!

One of the experimental topics for me is “Spinning With Locks”.  A few weeks ago we covered Part 1:  spinning textured yarns by combining locks and roving together in various ways.  Here is one such yarn that is made from kid mohair locks spun together with a wool roving (from “Puff”, a sheep that is a Border Leicester X Corriedale X Romney….I think).  I call this yarn “Daguerreotype”:

And some more.  The one on the left is Lincoln Locks combined with Costwold carded roving.  The one on the right-top is Wensleydale locks with Wensleydale combed top.  The one on the bottom-right (my favorite!) is Teeswater locks with Corriedale-silk carded roving.

Tomorrow we cover Part 2:  incorporating locks while plying 2 smooth singles together.  I’ve been working on two such strategies.  Here’s a picture of one of the yarns.  I call it “confetti”.  It consists of singles spun from undyed Bluefaced Leicester combed top with dyed locks of Bluefaced Leicester plyed into the yarn intermittently.  I got both the combed top and the dyed locks last summer at the Wisconsin Sheep & Wool Festival from Riverwinds Farm, now my go-to source for BFL.  (It’s also my go-to source for Cormo!)

I am enjoying playing with locks.  Some delightful surprises have arisen!