By Laurie Carlson Steger

In March this year, the Weavers’ Guild of Boston hosted Robbie LaFleur for a lecture and workshop about Frida Hansen.  I was busy weaving my open warp style tapestry when I saw an email from Vibeke Vestby, founder of Digital Weaving Norway. She invited me to submit a woven artwork for an exhibit in Norway to be held in August.  YES! I was immediately planning the trip.  The exhibition would be held in conjunction with a conference celebrating thirty years of the Thread Contoller (TC1 or TC2) loom. The Sundvolden Hotel in Krokklevia, on the edge of a fjord north of Oslo, was a perfect location for an August event. 

The conference, Digital Weaving: Innovation Through Pixels, featured talks from thirty textile professionals who varied from University professors, designers, desearchers, skilled TC2 trainers and independent artists. Twelve speakers represented the USA.  The loom is the new tool on the block in Maker Spaces, university textile departments, prototyping  engineering labs, and is part of weaving residency programs in locations such as the Icelandic Textile Center.

A catalogue with the conference title was also published.  It tells the story of Vibeke Vestby’s background, and how the TC looms were developed at Tronrud Engineering Moss. 

Vibeke’s dream to build a modern tool for hand weavers began in the 1980s as computer technology and creative programs for drafting weaving patterns were just beginning. After years of research and development, the first loom was sold in 1995. In 1996 I attended one of the first workshops to introduce the TC loom, held at Montclair State University, New Jersey, and I put the loom on my wish list.  

Vibeke Vestby has persevered with a vision for weavers that has changed the way textiles can be developed.  In 2006, when The Woven Pixel: Designing for Jacquard and Dobby Looms Using Photoshop, written by Alice Schlein and Bhakti Ziek, was published, it became the weaving manual that instructed how Photoshop could be used to design woven structures.  Programs such as Photoshop, Fiberworks, WeavePoint and Arahweave, developed for the needs of weavers, now enable rapid design manipulation. A new software was introduced at this year’s conference, AdaCAD. It was developed by Laura Devendorf at the Unstable Design Lab at the University of Colorado, Boulder, and is an exciting open source program.  Now, in 2025, with 300 looms installed in locations around the world, weavers gathered to share stories about the TC loom and how it has transformed their weaving practice.

The conference presented opportunities for the TC loom weavers to sit together and swap experiences of working with the loom, to buid new connections within the growing community of digital weavers, and to make new friends.

Weaving traditions depend upon a span of time for them to be thoroughly adapted into general practice.  As textile professionals, we study ancient techniques and honor the methods of our ancestors.  As the mode of learning and showing respect, showcasing difficult technical skills that have been personally mastered is a way to prolong the heritage of the craft.

New weavers who begin a weaving journey have digital skills in image manipulation, a library of pixelated weave structures and intuitive computer skills that allow them to jump into weaving at a high level.  These innovators take materials at hand, without necessarily worrying whether the sample or fragment will endure the test of time.  Weavers delve into the field to combine engineering with multimedia. They explore texture and how to project emotions. They use materials that sense information or function as an aid to human experience with temperature detection or moisture containment or sound responsive properties. Artists push the boundaries of  “tapestry” with personal, social or political messages woven into the cloth. This wall hanging by Katia Huhmarkangas takes medical and other tech world imagery of the heart and combines them into a personal statement. 

After many years, I became a TC2 loom owner in 2016. Taking workshops with Cathryn Amidei, the USA representative, (cathrynamidei.com) and with online tutorials plus many hours of trial and error, my weaving has found a personal style. The piece I sent was woven from one of my drawings inspired by jazz musician, Lyle Mays. 

The honored designers that have shaped this generation of textile makers — such as Dorothy Liebes, Lucienne Day, Jack Lenor Larson, Annie Albers, Sheila Hicks, or the legendary Frida Hanson, to name a few — will be joined by Vibeke Vestby as a breakthrough inventor, educator and developer of modern methods of textile practice.

With the fjord just steps away from the Sundvolden Hotel, my husband and I took an evening walk.  We could hear sounds of hammering nearby.  Like the Pied Piper calling to men everywhere, we tracked down the source to discover The Hardraade Project, a community of people building a replica of an authentic Viking ship. They were using all the old techniques: wooden pegs, blacksmithed fixtures and handwoven linen sails. They were rushing to complete it for a planned launch on August 30. 

Visits the to Fram Museum, the Kon Tiki Museum (image: Kon Tiki) the Nobel Center and the Oslo National Museum of Art filled our two days left before heading home. 

After learning about the newest weaving technology, viewing historical Norwegian tapestries at the National Museum completed my full circle of travel inspiration.

October 2025