I have been working on this for several years on and off. I am spinning light laceweight natural colored tussah silk, in hopes to use it to knit a shawl. It is likely less expensive for me to spin my own silk laceweight that is fine enough for gossamer shetland, estonian and orenburg lace shawls.
The only silk gossamer weight I can find that is weaving cones, and it's often to heavy and very expensive. Maybe I'll buy it one day.
Here's my current spin!
I'm using both a top whorl spindle and a supported spindle to try and get as thin as I can. It helps to make the project portable.
On the cardboard bobbin, you can see mulberry silk. I'm doing the same thing with it. I just need to respin it to make it thinner. I like working with the tussah silk more. It seems to be less slippery and has more 'tooth' to it.
The supported spindle is a dpn with a bead I bought. The top whorl spindle is a dowel with a hook and some polymer clay. I had fun making them and they spin very fast, but you have to practice a lot to make a good, fast, and balanced spindle.
One day I do plan to see how actual Victorian silk spindles work. They're like a bicone at the top, and taper down. They are essentially top whorl spindles.
Anyway, I have more craft stuff to show, including tatting! Take care for now,
-JT
