Meet Deborah, our expert weaver

A long time ago, when I was just 17, we had an exchange student from Sweden. After we graduated he went back to Sweden, and we wrote to each other every day. One year after graduation we got married and I moved to Sweden. First I had to learn the new language. Soon after that, I enrolled in a weaving course. We met once a week and between lessons we could fold up our looms and take them home in the car. I learned a lot in that course, but I wanted to learn more. I went to an art school where we wove two days per week. After that I actually got a job weaving in a small factory in Stockholm. In 1974 it was only one weaver, but before electricity there were many handweavers there. It was founded in 1832. I had one assistant who prepared the spindles for an electric loom that wove six bands at once. We worked together setting up the loom.

After I had been there for about six months I was privileged to be accepted into an intense weaving course, which was five days a week for one school year. There were sixteen students in the class and ages ranged from about 18-42. We often worked in pairs, helping each other set up the looms. There was an enormous list of techniques we were expected to learn during this course, in fact too many for the amount of time we had, so we had to choose which techniques were most desirable to learn and to complete the course make small samples of the remainder. The reason for the impossible situation was that the course was planned years before when the school days were longer. After this school year I worked as an apprentice for about a month. I took a number of shorter courses in special techniques as well.

I returned to school about 25 years later and took the same intensive course again, as the computer had entered our lives and that has been great. I have had my own weaving school in Sweden since 2019 and now we have a new venture in Utah. We will be teaching the Swedish techniques with looms from Sweden. Welcome!

Here is Deborah while she is working on a large green fabric which was for a jacket.