The pattern of the weave itself can determine many material properties of a woven fabric. Its history is intertwined with politics at the global scale and the domestic one: woven fabrics are in our clothes and our homes, as well as our agricultural geotextiles and our aerospace carbon-fiber hulls. Weaving is one of humanity's oldest technologies, with variants across human cultures and time. We describe the mechanical and electronic implementation of our loom and show examples of its use for personal fabrication. In taking this approach, we aim to serve a range of end users including artisans and researchers, whether for skill-building, for rapid prototyping, or for creative reflection. Our approach combines the flexibility of fully analog handweaving with the computational affordances of digital fabrication: it enables the incorporation of special techniques and materials, as well as allowing for the possibility of computational and creative interventions in the weaving process itself. Our loom is explicitly a hand loom: that is, a weaver is required to operate the weaving process and may mediate row-by-row patterning and material specifics like yarn tension. Our loom can be assembled for under US $200 with 3D printed parts, and it can be controlled straightforwardly over USB. We present an inexpensive tabletop loom that offers fully computational patterning while maintaining the flexibility of handweaving.
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