Two differnent types of tapestry looms: the frame and 'I' loom style. They are woven on by winding on 3 layers of yarn and then weaving a fourth layer to hold the other 3 in place. Typically, the looms come as a sort of wooden or plastic frame with nails or pins sticking out at regular intervals, either in groups of 3 or evenly spaced. Pin looms are a deceptively simple-looking type of loom. The spacing of the slots and holes determines the sett, or how many warp ends you have per inch. The heddles contain evenly spaced slots and holes. The rigid-heddle loom, shown in the photo at top, gets its name from the heddle used to lift and lower warp ends and to beat them in place after each pick. When the shed is created by lifting or lowering every other warp end so the weft thread travels over-under-over-under, that is called plain weave. Some looms have a mechanism for creating a shed for others you use your fingers or other tools to create those layers. The shed is the space created between two layers of warp when some warp ends are lifted and others are lowered. The weft is the yarn you weave from side-to-side within the warp, and often (but not always) the weft yarn is wound onto a shuttle. Each thread in the warp is called a warp end. Some looms will also let you move the warp forward as you weave.

Warp is the yarn put on the loom-the primary job of the loom is to hold the warp at tension. Basic Vocabularyīefore we delve into loom types, it’s helpful to know a few terms. So here’s a roundup of looms we regularly feature in Easy Weaving with Little Looms and a bit about what makes each loom unique. If you’re newly interested in weaving and aren’t sure what loom you want, it can be a bit confusing. One of the fun (and sometimes challenging) parts of working on Easy Weaving with Little Looms is that the magazine covers so many different types of small-loom weaving.

Weaving loom plans