It's Done, it's DONE! I am so happy and proud to show you my first completed Viking Knit (Weave) project! I chose to make a copper weave to keep the costs down in case I messed up my first project in this style, but it turns out the weave is actually very easy to do and quite fun too. I made a custom bail for my new VikingMonkee, Thor, made by Glass artist extraordinaire Louise of Fireseed.
It starts out as loops on a wooden mandrel, and you keep going until you have 10-12 inches of this (you gently pull it off the mandrel as you go so that you have enough of the dowel to weave on).
When you have enough length, you pull it through a draw plate (initially I just pulled it with my hands and it elongated and became tighter), until you get the desired diameter of weave. Mine ended up about 17 inches long, a little longer than I wanted it, but I wanted it to be a small diameter, which explains it. Next time (for me anyway) I'll weave a shorter amount of wire to make a slightly shorter necklace. This necklace took about 25 FEET of fine, 26 gauge copper wire to make this slim, graceful and very soft woven necklace. Pretty neat!
Here is my little Thor, all done up on his custom bail (the part that suspends the pendant from the necklace). I used a small spiral at the bottom to complement the chain, and made a simple wrapped loop at the top to hold the pendant onto the chain.This one is mine, but what do you think? Would you wear a similar styled necklace? What about the bead? What kind of bead would you have? Should I keep this one or sell it? I'm kind of inclined to keep this one, but would you buy something similar?
I'm off to try this in sterling silver, I have another of Louise's beads that is perfect for a bracelet, though it isn't cute like my Thor bead, it is a beautiful, fluid round bead. I'll keep you updated on that.
I want to thank Louise for inspiring me to make this necklace, without you, I'd still be blankly staring at the components!
That's all for now!
