Memories?

My earliest childhood memories of weaving go back to 1968 - 1975.
In Appenzell Mittelland,where I lived until 1997, there were very few home weavers left at that time.
The weavers. But in Appenzell they mostly worked in the cellar.

Our house was off to the side, in the middle of a meadow. The next house was about 50 metres away.
Hans Rechsteiner (28.02.1893 - 24.10.1986), a weaver of flat stitches and a well-known string music player, lived here.

One of my possible ways to school led through his garden, which was planted almost exclusively with johannis berries.

In the cellar of his house there was an old loom and as late as the 70's Hans Rechsteiner often wove there. You could also hear the clunk-clunk of the shuttle outside, and I heard it a lot. I heard it a lot, as well as the dulcimer playing in the room above.

I remember that he once took me into the cellar and showed me the loom.
The cellar room was low, and was halfway under the floor. The windows were single-glazed. In winter, front windows were installed. He probably tried to explain to me this wooden construction with masses of threads. - In vain - Hans Rechsteiner was weaving handkerchiefs, or hankies as we called them. He explained to me that these patterns could only be made by hand.

In kindergarten I had to weave a small calendar background. That was all to weave throughout school. I was much more interested in the workshop of another neighbour. (Navigation image)

During my apprenticeship as a machine mechanic at SULZER Winterthur, we assembled TLL's, separating bar layers. A machine part for cutting the fabric web on the running industrial loom. After that, I had no access to weaving for decades.
The attempt to teach my children to weave in 2013 probably failed because of my own commitment.

Hans Rechsteiner's Weberhöckli at the time when he was still weaving. In the foreground the author with his siblings.

My daughter weaving on a sailing trip. A short episode.

My first weaving piece from kindergarten in 1971. I still own it today, thanks to my mother.