Over the weekend, I read on Mary Corbet's Needle'nThread site (a gem and a godsend, that site) that slate frames and Japanese embroidery frames are basically the same concept and thus pretty interchangeable. So I double checked with some ladies on the corresponding Facebook group and discovered that I could indeed lace my fabric around the warp bars rather than through the holes. So I decided to give this a shot.
First I sewed some 1 1/2"-wide herringbone tape to the edges of the muslin:
Then, using my giant slate frame lacing needle and super thick lacing string, I sewed the herringbone tape to the frame by going around the warp bars:
That needle is really sharp, so I had to be careful, but thankfully, I did not end up stabbing myself. Once I got both sides sewn, I tightened the string to get the fabric fairly smooth and stretched, but not yet completely taut:
I didn't want it drum-tight yet because this is just the backing fabric. I still needed to sew the silk ground fabric to the muslin. So I aligned the grain of the silk fabric with the grain of the muslin as well as I could. I will admit, I feel like this was mostly guess work because the grain is very hard to see on both fabrics, as they are such tight weaves. Since I couldn't pick out a real grain line to save my life, I just tried to get the selvage of the silk to be reasonably parallel to the edge of the muslin and the warp bars. And then I pinned it in place and from the center of each side to the edge, I sewed the silk down with herringbone stitch:
I had read somewhere that silk has to be tacked down on the diagonal or else the threads will separate and pull apart at the edges, hence the herringbone stitch.
Once I had sewed the whole thing down and removed the pins, I unwound the split dowels a bit and fiddled with loosening the fabric until I could wind the dowels the 1 3/4 turns they're supposed to be wound and get the fabric super taut in the warp direction. It took me several tries to achieve the right tension. There's probably some kind of cool trick to it, and maybe someday when this pandemic and quarantine are over, I'll be able to take real Japanese embroidery lessons and learn what that trick is. But in the meantime, I just did the best I could. I was somewhat concerned that the fabric wasn't quite even in terms of grain line, but hopefully it will work out okay.
Lastly, I tightened the fabric in the weft direction. Since the string was already reasonably snug, I did this by screwing the nuts tighter against the warp bars, which forced them farther apart:
Once the fabric was drum-tight and I could bounce my fingers on it without any give and hear that nice, hollow drum sound, I tightened the second nut against the first to lock everything in place. I must say, this is the best feature of this embroidery frame. It is super easy to tighten and loosen the fabric in the weft direction. I wish there was a similarly simple and obvious option for tightening in the warp direction. But for now, the fabric is very smooth and taut, and I'm really pleased with it.
This whole process took me a few hours to do - it was quite labor intensive. But I'd been prepared for that by Mary Corbet's description of dressing a slate frame. And perhaps because it was my first time doing it, I found it really enjoyable and interesting. Maybe the charm wears off after the tenth time. :)
Since the fabric was ready, it was time to get my goldwork pattern ready. I had already traced it onto vellum last week, so now, using my bobbin lace pillow and pricker, I pricked along the lines of the pattern:
It was really nice having my lace pillow for this part, as it's ideal for pricking. I imagine this would be a little trickier without it. The pricker I have also works great because it's easy to hold and super sharp.
So that's where I am at the moment. Next, I need to pounce the pattern onto the silk with my little pouncing tool and jar of gray pounce. But I'm waiting for my order from the JEC to arrive because it includes a small paintbrush and shell powder for painting the lines on after I pounce. USPS says it will actually be here tomorrow, which is earlier than I'd dared hoped for, so maybe tomorrow or Wednesday I can transfer the pattern!
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