Galaxy Rolags

I don't make art yarn that much. When I do want to make an art yarn, I like to pick a theme to stick to for the yarn so I have a jumping off point of where to get started. For this yarn I knew I wanted to try two new things; making my own rolags and corespinning. To give me some direction in my rolag blending I chose this inspiration photo:

I thought it would be fun to recreate the colors of the Milky Way in yarn! Looking at the photo I knew I needed to use a rich navy blue fiber as the base and add in pops of color/texture. I went with Ashford Corriedale Top in Indigo for this base fiber. I also grabbed Hidden Valley Coopworth Locks in Blue/Purple because they were the perfect color to go with my space theme, and they would add some funky texture in. Soffsilk Sari Silk would mix up my fiber content and the Sweetieblend added some more bright colors to my galaxy look. I had some Silk Noil laying around that I figured would make great pops of white to represent stars. Then finally, I had to add some sparkle! Angelina Iridescent Fiber is so fun to work with I grabbed two colors, Cobalt and Copper to add in to my starry night sky.

I made my rolags on the Ashford Blending Board because it's really sturdy and easy to use for a first time rolag maker!

Then it was time to get blending! I first put down a layer of the  Indigo Corriedale because I want that to be the main color of my blend. It's also important to always sandwich non wool fibers (like my Angelina!) in between two layers off wool, so generally you want to have wool as your base. 

Then I layered in spots of my  Soffsilk. I didn't want total coverage for this layer since they are supposed to represent the glowing bits in the galaxy photo. 

I put my  Coopworth Locks over this layer to give the colors more depth. Again, I didn't want complete coverage for this layer, but I did spread out the locks a bit more than I did for the Soffsilk. 

Now it's time for some stars! I added on tiny little clumps of my  silk noil, keeping them spaced very far apart and not too big! I think these really pop!

Now it's time for sparkles! I did these in vertical stripes across the board, cobalt, copper, cobalt, copper. 

Then it was time to sandwich all this yummy texture in more Corriedale! 

At this point I had plenty of fiber on my board so I rolled these babies up. I think they turned out to match my theme photo very nicely! 

I kept blending up rolags until I ran out of the Corriedale. Since I used my silk, Angelina, and locks sparingly I have plenty of those left over for a future project. 

In order to spin these Rolags I used my  Lendrum Original using the Jumbo Plying Head on the largest whorl. I used a Mohair/Silk laceweight yarn as my core because it is really strong but still has lots of texture for the fiber to grab onto. It was my first time spinning corespun, so I practiced holding the fiber at a 90 degree angle to the core and adding more fiber to different parts of the yarn. I think considering it was my first time the finished yarn came out well! 

It's definitely very bulky! It has over 100g of fiber in the skein but is only about 100 yards of yarn. I think the pops of texture and color will make this fun to do some tapestry weaving with. 

We would love to see pictures of any rolags you blend up! Share them with us on  Facebook or tag us on Instagram!