Lauren Puchowski, an artist and freelance writer based in New Jersey, created this.
The boomloom is a portable loom invented by Lauren Puchowski. She created it to make weaving more intuitive and expressive, bridging the gap between craft and art. Puchowski also aimed to provide a tactile and analog experience, countering smartphone compulsions.
The patent-pending boomloom is a modern adaptation of an old technology, the rotating heddle bar, condensed into a one-piece frame. The heddle bar creates the shed (space between warp threads), eliminating the need to pass yarn in and out—just back and forth through the shed. Keeper slots facilitate easy stringing by capturing the start and end of the warp thread. The EPI (ends per inch) is approximately 6.
The loom consists of just six parts made from aluminum, beech, and maple, without any screws or fasteners. I assemble and finish the looms in my workspace in Jersey City, NJ, where I live with my husband and kids. We’ve sold looms to customers worldwide, including places like France, Japan, Mexico, Canada, Australia, Alaska, Los Angeles, Guam, London, Colorado, New Zealand, Brooklyn, Switzerland, and Salt Lake City.
Puchowski successfully put the boomloom, available in two sizes, into production. You can purchase them on her website, and they are also sold at the Cooper Hewitt Museum Shop.
You can see what folks have made with the boomloom on Puchowski’s Instagram.
