I have a new set of heddles for you! This spring I thought it was too long since I made people-shaped heddles, and when I thought of making the simpler version of a heddle wearing a dress (Those with no arms or feet, which take me much less time to make than the ones that have them) I got to work! Someone told me recently that they wanted unpainted heddles and I might make a set of them as well, but it’s just so fun to explore new varieties of the heddles…

It’s been three years since I started carving heddles in earnest now, and it has changed my life in a way I could’t imagine. To the right are some of the heddles from the first set I offered for sale, ans while the heddles in this new set look much like those first ones there has also been a lot of evolution happening. The “dress” is the latest addition to this heddle style!

**Lins seed oil paint, again (And the wood is birch)**

For the heddles in this set I have used a lins seed oil paint, which means that I have mixed color pigments with lins seed oil. I can never remember if the boiled or unboiled variety is best for paint but I use boiled and it works fine.
When I started using this kind of paint I was told that the thinnest coat possible is the best, because one wants to be able to see the grain of the wood through the paint… and I agree. If added too generously the paint sets into a shiny surface that takes for ever to dry and covers the grain of the wood, but if you wipe the excess paint off after painting it dries enough for you to touch it in about two days.
This time I took it a bit further and wiped the paint off with my hands, and I think that made a difference! The surface seems a bit more matte than when I only wipe it off with paper or cloth, so that’s nice! I think using both zinc and titanium white in combination with the prussian blue pigment helped a lot too, its like the titanium is a really fine pigment that gives a lot of coverage which is great when you want to paint a thin coat of paint that doesn’t clog up the wooden surface.

**Heddle size**

A hand is, after all, a hand, and after last heddle sale when i tried to avoid using my own beat-up ones I got a whole lot of helpful messages on the theme “Maybe use your hand for scale“?
Well, you were right, it might just be the best way of showing scale after all. Here’s the biggest heddle in the set, one from the middle spectrum and some of the smallest ones. Check out the separate images below for exact measurements!

This set consists of 16 heddles that will be released on June 13, 21.00 Swedish time. The heddles will be for sale in the webshop, not here on the blog. Here is a preview for you guys, so you can have a look at the heddles before they hit the web shop. Click or tap the images to enhance them and see the heddle measurements! If you are buying heddles from me for the first time you might want to read this blog post in preparation.

Ps. When browsing this blog post on a mobile device the text with the measurement + price info does not appear automatically when you tap a picture to enhance it. After enhancing the picture, look at the bottom right hand corner of the screen where there is a small white dot. Tap that and the info will appear!