[Fiction question] What is the correct language for describing a loom that is all set up and ready for work?

We’d call it threaded back in weaving class. It just means setting up your warp, stringing many threads through what looks like rows of whale teeth in the back of the loom, and then getting them taut and ready for putting int he weft, which is the action that people think of when they think of weaving. It’s sometimes the much longer and more frustrating process, though – especially if you make something like a warp-face rug.

Or do you mean even before that? With the whole thing as yet untouched? We had no particular term for that state of being.

Thanks, @wildpotato, I think that’s just what I’m after. “Her seven-foot weaver’s loom stood threaded and ready for the start of a new project.” Would that be right?

Have you ever worked on pottery? What would you call a new batch of ceramic clay?—a fresh pot, bag, bucket, box, <other> of clay that had just arrived? The woman does fabric and ceramic crafts, and this is just a quick description of her in her studio.

Threaded is probably the correct term, although an alternative might be all warped up and ready to go, since it is the warp that you thread on ahead of time, and the weft thread that you weave in and out. That would be an “in-joke” way of saying it.

That would be mostly right, except that in a weaver’s mind the project began even before the threading started. And the threading can often be the most labor-intensive part of it. Weaving is a painstakingly planned process – what you really start with is measurements, color and thread choice (very important to choose the right warp for the job, as it must be strong enough to not snap when taut and yet flexible enough to make the kind of cloth you desire), measuring all your warp to the right length, knotting it onto the back of the loom, and setting the heddles and some other setting boards at the apex of the loom. Then you thread the heddles and the shed (the thing you pull towards you to set the new line of weft into place), and tie the warp threads to the front board. Then you tighten the whole thing, re-thread any that might have snapped, and you’re done threading. Wefting usually goes much quicker, unless you’re doing a double-layer rug. That first link on the google search is a good set of instructions.

Which is all to say, I might alter the sentence slightly to something like: “Her seven-foot loom stood threaded and ready for the completion of her project.” If it is a situation such that she should be starting a new project, then maybe “Her seven-foot loom stood ready to be threaded for the beginning of a new project.”

I’m not a potter, but I’ll point the captain over here in the morning; he’d know something like that.

@YARNLADY That’s cute :o)

It’s threaded with creamy white. Thread, not yarn? It has to be threaded already. Do I have to say threaded with creamy white thread? That’s ugly.

You could always say, “Threaded with a creamy white <type of fiber>.” (Wool, alpaca, cotton, linen, bamboo, silk, etc.)

Well, when I worked with some clay many, many years ago, it came in a bag, and inside that bag was a huge block (rectangular prism-shape) of clay. (See image.) So you could say “bag of clay”, I think.

Yuck, that is awkward. You could say yarn. But most weavers say thread. Compare this google to this one, in terms of hits. I like evegrimm’s suggestion. We most often worked with cotton because it’s strong yet stretchy. You could try “threaded with creamy white cotton fiber.” Though that sounds slightly artificial. What we usually said was “threaded with creamy white warp,” but I’m not sure if the public at large would understand what that means.

Ok, I think I’ve got it. Many thanks! Just what I needed. Don’t worry about the clay question; I handled it.

If you were to re-thread it, would that be like “Let’s do the loom warp, again?

@NewZen I think it’s “Lets re-do the loom warp” actually. We only try to say it once, because three times fast would put us in a different universe.

I’d say something like, “The loom was already warped with creamy white wool; she was ready to begin the weaving.” Or maybe “She had already measured and strung the creamy white woolen warp threads…”

I don’t know about looms, but as for the clay, some hard-core potters mine their own clays from local sources (if they’re lucky enough to live near a deposit of workable clay), then wash, sieve and dry it down to a plastic consistency. More often, commercial potters mix their own clay “bodies” (the term for a plastic clay that’s suitable for pottery) from various commercially mined base clays that they to achieve particular working qualities, colors, firing characteristics, etc. Still others will buy moist clay bodies ready for use, but this is expensive and doesn’t allow for customization, so it tends to be frowned upon by purists.

In any case, the last step in preparing the clay for use is to eliminate as much air as possible from the body and align the flat clay particles by “wedging”. This can be done mechanically using a “pug mill” (which is how a large quantity would be prepared), or by hand (on a more artisinal level). It can be done by pushing the wad of clay repeatedly through a taut wire, or by a kind of spiral kneading. It’s a physically demanding process, but one that many potters value as a way of physically and mentally connecting to the feel of the clay.

So your potter could have a pile of wedged clay, ready to be thrown.

edit: ”...base clays that they blend to achieve…”

I would get rid of “creamy white” and call the color “cream,” “ivory,” “off-white.” E B non-creamy White said, “Let’s kill most of the adjectives.” (Or something akin to that.

@gailcalled I thought it was kill all the lawyers…no wait, that was someone else. Good advice though.

Just for giggles, the bags of liquid clay used in pouring ceramic molds is called slip. Not sure why. Just a bit of trivia from my days as a mold man at a ceramics shop.

Ok, here’s how that paragraph went. Ok for technical details?

“Mary Lafayette dreamed. She was in her studio in Roslindale, in the garage that she and Albert had worked for months to convert into a work space for her. Through the skylight that they had constructed, the clear light of April poured down into her haven of creative energy. Her seven-foot weaver’s loom stood threaded with a warp of creamy white wool, ready for the advancement of her new project, but her attention today was on a fresh supply of pottery clay that she had just brought home in a white pail. She was at her wheel, working the treadle with her foot and feeling the smooth, wet, firm but yielding matter take shape between her nimble hands, growing from a formless lump to a tall, tapering cylinder with gentle, pleasing contours. As she worked, deftly pressing the clay to guide its form, she felt it pressing back. A sense of urgency came over her and she speeded up her action with the treadle. She looked over at the loom and saw that the shuttle was moving by itself in time to her rhythm, passing back and forth across the warp without benefit of heddle or shed. All at once the taut vertical threads stretched and snapped, collapsing in a heap at the foot of the loom.”

Now, @gailcalled, you may be right, but this is NaNoWriMo. I am writing in don’t-look-back mode toward my 50,000-word goal, allowing myself to fuss over details while I am right there with them because that is how I work, but not going back and fixing anything at all. This story is overwritten to an extreme that would make Bulwer-Lytton blush, complete with what is almost a “dark and stormy night” opening line. But I am taking Chris Baty’s advice to heart and giving my inner editor the month off. And that goes for outer editors too, dear.

“Creamy white” is important to this all-too-obvious dream scene.

@Jeruba: Oooh, I’ll have what she’s having.

And shouldn’t that studio be on the English Moors? Roslindale, indeed?

Roslindale, yes. Very, very humble home setting for her. The mansion is on the other coast, and it isn’t hers, but she has gone there with the Texas firefighter and the Finnish dancer and the woman with the New Hampshire farm to bring the yacht-owning millionaire down for what he did in South Africa (and a lot of other places).

Lurve for NaNoWriMo. :)

@Jeruba: So sex is the new metaphor for weaving?

@gailcalled Surely you are familiar with the role of “weaving” in the Odyssey.

@YARNLADY: But Penelope wasn’t getting any.

That sounds great to me! And it all seems technically correct except for “without benefit of heddle or shed,” because the heddles do not move in any case. And one needs to make use of them in order to have the warp threaded. We do use pedals, like piano pedals. They make the rows of the warp move up and down for a new row with the shuttle. So it might make more sense to say pedals instead of heddles. However, cloth cannot be made without using the shed and pedals.

@wildpotato, how do I fix it so it’s right?

I’m still here, in suspense… how will this end…?

How about this?

“She looked over at the loom and saw that the shuttle was moving by itself, passing back and forth across the warp in time to her rhythm.”

Good idea to nix the details – leaves no possibility for the sentence to ring wrongly in any weaver’s ear. It certainly sounds fine to mine.

Thanks, @wildpotato. Authenticity is everything to me in writing, even when I am grinding out preposterous rubbish like this just for the fun (and experience) of it. The plot can make no sense or be nonexistent, but I’m damned if I’ll let a detail of prop or setting ring false.

Anytime! :)

sigh

@Jeruba; Just be careful to keep your heroine’s heaving bosoms out of the warp threads (or do I mean woof?)