Surface Texture

At the beginning of the year, Ruth posted a Surface Texture Challenge for the First Quarter Studio Challenge on the Felting and Fiber Studio site..

I love taking photos of anything interesting, so I really liked the idea of this challenge. Not long after Ruth announced it, we had a really frosty day here. I was inspired by a patch of frosty moss in the back garden and made my first wet felted piece for the challenge. I used a blend of green merino shades and carded plastic fibre made from recycled plastic bottles. You can read more here.

My second wet felted piece was a bit more of a challenge... mouldy cheese :)
Here's the source of inspiration:

                                     

and the felted piece:

Ruth was inspired by bark and made a really nice wet felted Kindle cover using water soluble fabric, machine stitching and viscose fibre, it turned out really well. You should also check out these amazing felt sculptures by LizB. If you'd like to join in, come over to the Felting and Fiber Studio, click 'Challenges' in the categories on the right, and you'll see all the related posts.

Plastic Fibre

This is my finished twisted plastic piece for the Felting and Fiber Studio quarterly Studio Challenge. The twists are made from a blend of merino and plastic fibre made from recycled plastic bottles. The plastic fibre feels really fluffy and 'bouncy', it blends with the merino quite well. I've used it a few times before and it's great for creating 'spongy' effects. The base is 3 layers of merino, and the twists were layed on top so that the tips went over the edge of the base . The finished piece is nice and thick, but doesn't feel heavy, and it's really soft.