Bulgarian card woven belts

Designs can be made in various ways. The two most common design techniques among the belts I work with is what I call 'automatic turning' and 'two-color' designs.

Automatic designs come from arranging the threads in a specific way and turning the cards continuously in one direction. When the threads get too tangled in the back from turning only in one direction, the weaver can start turning continuously in the other direction, or flip the cards and continue going in the same direction. This reverses the direction of diamonds, arrows and slanted lines.

Two-color designs are made by using two threads of each color in each card, and creating the design by controlling each individual card along the length of the warp.