What the Heck is a Networked Twill?

Achieving curves in a piece of handwoven cloth has always  been a difficult task given that the warp and weft intersect each other at right angles.  The jacquard loom made curves possible because  the manipulation of each individual warp thread allows designs to take place one thread at a time.  Ethnic weavers have achieved it through skilled and time consuming hand manipulation of their warp and weft threads.  But, for the floor loom weaver, curves were limited to optical illusions in designs.

In 1988 a pair of French mathematicians named Oliver Masson and Francois Roussel came up with a method of laying threading and treadling over a network.  Their published work called Shaft Switching & Graph Design was pretty sophisticated for the mathematically challenged and the translation into English was less than perfect.   An adventurous American weaver, Alice Schlein, analyzed the diagrams in the book and made the information accessible to handweavers around the world.  Her book on the subject is called Network Drafting:  An Introduction and was published by Bridgewater Press in 1994.  Since that time, handweavers with multishaft looms have been weaving amazing curves and geometric designs using network drafting.