Tying Off the Bottom and Adding a Hanging Cord
Okay. Middle's filled in, you've caught your mistakes early instead of falling in love with them, and now you're staring at a bunch of loose cord ends wondering what stops the whole thing from unraveling. Fair question. Let's finish it.
Tying off the bottom
You've got a few options depending on how your hanging looks, but the simplest and the one I teach first is this: gather your working cords in small groups and tie one more square knot or a simple overhand knot at the bottom of each group, right where you want the knotted part to end and the fringe to start.
Don't skip this step thinking the fringe holds itself. It doesn't. A raw end with no knot below it will slowly work its way loose over months, especially with cotton, and you'll end up with a wall hanging that's shorter every year. One good knot at the base of each section and you're set for good.
So here's where I always mess up, or used to. I'd tie the bottom knot too high, trying to save cord, and end up with barely any fringe to work with. Leave yourself more length than feels right. You can always trim fringe shorter. You cannot make it longer.
Cutting your fringe
Remember what I said a few lessons back. Fringe gets trimmed last, not now, not "close enough for now." Leave it long and shaggy until the very end.
Here's why that matters more at this stage than any other. Once the hanging's off your work surface and up on a wall, gravity does something to it. The whole piece drops and settles, sometimes an inch, sometimes more depending on how many knots you've got stacked up. If you trim fringe flat while it's lying on your table, you'll hang it up and find one side's noticeably shorter than the other. Trim after it's hanging where you'll actually see it, standing back the way you will every day after this.
Adding the hanging cord
This is the part people skip planning for and then panic about at 9pm on a Sunday.
You need a separate length of cord, usually about 18 to 24 inches depending on how high you want it to hang and how long your dowel is. Fold it in half. Lay the folded loop over the top of your dowel, one on each end, then pull the two loose ends through the loop and tighten. That's it. Same basic move as starting your top rows, just done in reverse and only twice.
Do this on both ends of the dowel, then check that the cord's even on both sides before you knot the ends together at the top. Nothing worse than hanging a piece and watching it tilt because one side of the cord's two inches longer than the other. Measure twice. I know I say that about the wall hanging cord itself, but it applies here too.
If your dowel's heavier or your piece is big, use a slightly thicker cord for the hanger than you used in the body of the piece. It's not a burden to double up here, it just means the thing won't sag on you in six months.
A word about the wall itself
If you're hanging this on drywall, use an actual hook rated for the weight, not just a nail. Most of these hangings aren't heavy, but a loaded dowel with a few pounds of cord and maybe a plant or two woven in can pull a bare nail right out over time, usually while you're not looking, usually onto something you didn't want broken.
Saturday mornings
Deborah still does the parts her hands allow her to do. She's not tying square knots at this stage of things, the arthritis doesn't let her, but she's got a better eye for finishing than I do and always has. Saturday mornings we'll have the radio going in the kitchen, dance a little if the song's right, and she'll sit at the table and tell me my fringe is uneven before I've even hung the thing up.
She's usually right. That's the honest opinion I'll give you here: get a second set of eyes before you trim. You've been staring at this piece for weeks. You will not see what's crooked. Somebody who hasn't been staring at it will see it in about four seconds.
Before next time
Get your bottom knots tied and your hanging cord attached, but hold off on trimming the fringe until you've got it up on a wall or a hook, even a temporary one, so gravity can do its thing first.