Communal Loom

The Communal Loom is an art-therapy artifact that turns well-being data into a shared weaving. Evaluation of a health intervention is usually separate from the activity itself; here the two are the same act, so participants make the data and the artwork together.

The photos show how it works: each participant fills in a small card with a grid of answers (columns A–D, rows 1–8), and coloured yarns tied to the card carry those answers onto the loom. Woven row by row, the colours become a record of the group, in this case bands of navy, green, yellow and red on a white weft.

The loom is a large frame with black warp threads; how it was built is not documented here, though a frame like this is often cut from sheet stock. The accompanying paper (linked) describes the design and the sessions at Coler in detail.

Tip: keep the colour-to-answer mapping simple and visible next to the loom, so the finished weaving stays readable as data long after the session.

Partner: NYC Health + Hospitals/Coler