Day 21 - Creating a vöö

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This is a little step by step on how to warp an Estonian belt. I did this the morning after I had done this process, from memory. This method is used as "free hand" or without a loom to weave the actual belt. Belts are used in Estonian traditional clothing as part of the folk costumes. Each Parish has their own unique belts, colours and patterns with traditional Estonian weaving techniques. It is part of Estonian culture to wear traditional belts and back in the day young girls would learn how to make belts as part of their wedding gifts to guests, however this tradition is no longer practiced. These belts could be seen as Estonian band weaving, however they are traditionally used as belts. Below are some photos of when I learned this process and had a really fun time doing it!

• Get the pattern
• Measure your waist x3 +10%
• Get the wool and weigh it
• Get your linen thread. For thicker vöö you need thicker linen
• Get your board and space out the pegs and measure how you will wrap it to get the right length vöö
• Put a loose cardboard roll at the gate so you can later lift it off
• Dot the pattern so you know which side of the gate you will go on with each thread
• Start the first colour and wrap it around your board, ensuring you go the same way you measured it
• Tie the next thread to the first one, at the base, as with all of them and start the next colour as per the pattern
• Continue this process, ensuring you go alternate sides on the gate and you don’t miss a thread until the end of the pattern
• Repeat the process coming back the other way, doubling up the last thread
• Once finished, tie the threads together, to the tails of the original threads
• Turn the board on the side and thread a nylon thread from top to base, at the thin piece of dowel
• Place a piece of paper on top of the bottom layer of the thread
• Slipknot tie the end of the thread and place over thin dowel
• Use a piece of cardboard and stick at the top and wrap the nylon thread around once
• Look through the threads and see what is on top and pull the nylon through the first thread and wrap around the stick and board, not to tightly
• Repeat this process all the way along the gate area, ensuring you wrap the card the same way and holding the threads
• Once completed wrap a lot of nylon around the small stick in many ways and eventually tying it off with a double knot
• Wrap layers of masking tape around the knot, you really want to secure it
• Put the board upright again and tie ties around various parts of the threads
• Put a looser bigger one at the opposite end and side of gate, which will be used for hanging on a hook or tying to something to hold tension
• Gently lift your belt off and secure somewhere for tension
• Weight the wool
• Take the linen thread and create 10 lengths
• Double it over with the “thread stock” and start wrapping it around your fingers in a figure 8 until it’s finished, but keep the start of the fold on your pinky, that will be the pulling point when weaving
• Tie the ends together and wrap it ready for use
• Get inside the belt, make sure you have your weaving paddle and connect to your hand so you don’t blunt the tip
• To start, you need to lift the gate and make sure you have the strings going up
• Once you are confident it is neat at the bottom, put a short thinnish piece of card at the tightest tension spot
• Change the gate position to down and using your paddle, hit the card to create tension and structure
• Hold the strings open using the paddle and put the linen thread through, that was made previously
• Swap the direction of the gate then hit the linen thread down
• Put the linen thread back through the gate and put the whole bunch through the loop at the end and pull the loop to the edge and wack it down
• Change the direction of the gate using the paddle at the top end, putting your hand through and collecting all the threads and paddling it down
• Do alternate strings, up and down for about 5cm before you start the pattern
• Once you get to the pattern you need to count which numbered strings are up and which are down to start building the pattern
• Once at the end, repeat the up down method of open and shutting the gate to secure the pattern and do the knot thing at the end to finish off the vöö
• Cut the strings to finish it off