So, the blogosphere and socialmediasphere for weavers and fiber folks has been swirling with the scent of waffles. So to speak. I’ve been catching glimpses of Waffle Weave in from four to eight harnesses and more, in towels and blankets and more. I was intrigued. This is a weave that has stood the test of time, and is ready to be called back into production.

I couldn’t remember if I had ever tried Waffle Weave, but thought I should give it a try as towels, so I looked at my weaving references. The best version I came up with was from my trusty Mary E. Black’s New Key to Weaving. She recommends 8/2 unmercerized cotton sett at 24 epi, and I concurred.

Waffle Weave starts with a simple zig-zag twill threading and treadling, but the tie-up includes floats of increasing and decreasing lengths so that square cells are formed, creating cushiony, squishy pockets of warp and weft. The more harnesses that are used, the deeper the pockets get. For towels, which may get a lot of use, the length of floats should probably be kept to a minimum. The repeat for a square is 6 ends, so 24 epi makes a neat 4 squares per inch. I’ve seen directions for Waffle Weave towels that call for 20 epi, or 3 1/3 squares per inch, but thought the floats would then be too long for my comfort zone.

Pro tip: Notice that I started and ended the threading on harness 3. That was because I wanted to keep the warp float to a minimum length on the outside edges. I also used floating selvedges (always!) and added a touch more width to account for extra drawing-in.

The resulting towels, which are going in my Etsy shop btw, are fluffy and pillowy and sure to be hardworking kitchen friends.