This is a how-to to make a piece with the Monk’s Belt pattern bar. The loom is warped with a thin cotton warp thread. For the weft I use four colors of yarn: two thick and two thin. I use the thin for the plain weave background and the thick for the Monk’s Belt patterns that “float” over the plain weave. However, you can try this with any combination of thick and thin, textured, monochromatic or contrasting.

Basically you weave plain weave for the entire piece, alternating between positions 1 and 3. But as you go along, you will insert a row of Monk’s Belt between every plain weave row, to create the Monk’s Belt pattern.

The Monk’s Belt pattern I’ve done is roughly as follows.

• 5 red rows position 4

• 1 blue row position 2

• 15 red rows position 4

• 15 blue rows position 4

• 1 red row position 2

• 5 blue rows position 4

Remember that you will be weaving a plain weave row between each and every Monk’s Belt row, alternating between positions 1 and 3. So for example it will go: plain weave (3), Monk’s Belt (4), plain weave (1), Monk’s Belt (4), etc. I’ve used black yarn for the first section of plain weave, then aqua for the long section in the middle, then black again.

Customize this: Change the number of rows of any Monk’s Belt section, switch colors, thicknesses and textures of the background and the Monk’s Belt yarns.