Syd's Rope Goods
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a day of privates with fede and marta
🕑 Added 2025-07-09 15:52:10 +0000 UTCafter a weekend of teaching and causing trouble in london, kitten and i hopped on over to milan (only after seeing an ad for "visit new jersey" at the london city airport??) to spend a day learning from two of my favorite people.
i had a short list of fairly specific things i wanted to learn and work, as opposed to more general concepts. the nureki tk (in photo one!), a strappado that could would work well for kitten, and the squishy shape in photo five.
now that i'm home, i've pretty solidly fixated on the nureki tk. we learned two versions of it- a more maximalist and more minimalist version (see photo one and two!). so far, its felt somewhat nervewracking (no pun intended) for both me and the person i'm tying as it directly loads the hojo cuffs on the arms, which feels contradictory to a lot of thing's i've learned. BUT there is no "top wrap" like a usual tk, which of course distributes the load on the arms and chest in a completely different way than my usual stemless tk. i'm excited to see how this feels on someone who a traditional stemless tk might not usually work for due to nerviness or mobility. i'm excited to play with the aesthetic concept of maximalist hojo cuff madness in the back, minimalist almost-nothing in the front.
kitten and i have tied this strappado again once since these lessons and have found that it works extremely well for her hyper mobile shoulders. i've historically been pretty anxious about strappados and therefore don't tie them often. it's a bit of a cycle-- i don't tie them so i don't get better at them so i don't get less nervous about them so i don't tie them. perhaps this is my breakout of that cycle.
the squishy bug shape was an absolute blast to tie in the lesson, although i'm not exactly sure how practical it will be to tie in my actual practice. to get to that final shape, kitten had to single point a waist line for a good chunk of time. i'm excited to re-try and maybe slightly re-engineer to see if i can maneuver my way around that step.
Comments
Syd
yes! so far we've found: very loose double column above the elbows and a very tight and high-ish shoulder wrap works well for kitten. what seems to be key difference of this strappado as opposed to others i've learned is starting with the shoulders relaxed/even slightly internally rotated, and the externally rotating them as i tension the top wrap. for kitten, this helps her shoulders feel secure but we don't have to tie the elbows and forearms so damn tight that she immediately looses circulation.
knotholykoly
Their strappado works really well on Adorgeous' hyper mobile shoulders as well. We have to construct it similarly to what it looks like on Marta in that photo where we skip that cinch below the elbow. Would be cool to share some of the details of what you've been learning and incorporating!
