My first Ecuadora!

Diana teaching me to weave!

Two days ago I completed my first Ecuadora, it only took me about 20 hours from start to finish. Much slower than the eight hour average of the weavers. It's a time consuming process to weave a hat from start to finish, there are many tricks that I never would have been able to figure out on my own. Thankfully I had the inventors of the Ecuadora to teach me.

Day Two, learning to make my first pattern

In the beginning as the base grows new wefts (The fibers running vertically in the photo, sticking out of the bottom) need to be added periodically, meaning that apart from focusing on the weaving itself I had to be constantly aware of when to add more wefts. The wefts are always Toquilla Palm because it is more rigid than the plantain bark. 

Trying out a top hat while I work

Once enough wefts have been added it's smooth sailing for a little while, nothing to to but continue going round and round. Until I got to the level of the closure. Then it gets tricky again, I had to learn to weave in reverse, weave in one direction towards the gap, and then turn around and head back the way I came. This played quite a trick with my mind and it took a while before I got it down without messing up, almost every time I would turn around I would get stuck and have to think about the process all over again. The last bit is to make the clasp itself which requieres adding new wefts sideways to pull off. This was where Diana had to take over for a minute to get me started.

Finished the cap, now onto the visor, with a fedora and Ecuatopper in progress.

The visor was pretty easy compared to what I had to complete to get to this point, every day of weaving I was getting better and faster.

Almost finished!

Stoked about my new hat! It feels great to have finally completed an Ecuadora from start to finish!