Nylon

Nylon is a great versatile fibre for using with felt. It is soft, shiny and can be dyed with acid dyes just like wool or silk. It is also really inexpensive and a small amount goes a long way. I made this first piece using just 3 colours of merino and 3 shades of dyed crimped nylon fibre: red, yellow and blue. I blended them togther to make more shades. It was really fluffy when I layed it out, but felted really nicely and flat, and had a soft, warm feel.

After Felting:

For this second piece I used trilobal nylon. This is sometimes given fancy names like 'Firestar' and a price tag to match, but it's just super-bright, shiny, inexpensive nylon. I used a rainbow blend from World of Wool, but separated the colours and blended them with similar shades of merino. The nylon created a really interesting texture, it gave the felt a kind of open look, even though it was well felted.

Close up of a corner:

I'd love to see what you make with nylon, whether it's felting, spinning, weaving or anything else :)

If you're interested in trying out different fibres, have a look at the Felting and Fiber Studio site, we have a section for other fibres, and have photos of man made and plant based fibres and photos of them used in felting. We also have an 'other fibres' category for all posts related to that.