Flower Shaped Vessel from a Flat Resist.

I didn't realise it has been a month since my last blog post! I always feel bad when I leave it so long, but I try to post on the same days I post on The Felting and Fiber Studio site, and sometimes I'm so tired and my eyes ache so much after that I just don't have the energy or the will. If it wasn't such a faff to sign in and out of different gmail accounts to do it too, I'd be more inclined. And, I'm fairly certain there's only one person (Hi Ali! ) who ever reads it who doesn't read the studio site blogs.

Anyway! ... In case you missed it, Ruth posted the First Quarter Challenge on the Felting and Fiber Studio Site about flat resists, I've used flat resists before, mostly for surface design, simple cases, and a few bags. I have made a few 3D items with flat resists: some bird pods, a few hats, and even a supposed seed pod which looked like the rib cage of a dead animal, but I think I've only tried a vessel once and it was a bit flimsy. So, I thought I'd try a vessel again. I decided on a flower shape, I can't find the actual resist, but it was basically a flower shape:

I used some 27 mic coloured Merino batt I bought from wollknoll and used some silk hankies over the top. This is how it looked from above:

How the underneath looks:

And a kind of side view:

This is where the silk hankie was fine:

And this is where the silk hankie was thicker:

And this is a close up of the batt texture:

If I did it again, I would make the shape more curvy, where the petal shapes met, it was a sharp V shape and the vessel is too thin there, and in some places little holes. This is looking through the vessel opening at a thin patch:

In case you missed it on the studio site, I gave a heads up for my 4th Quarter Challenge which I'll post about around October. Basically, all the challenges this year are on felting techniques, and the theme of mine is 'threads and yarns', so start collecting (all those things you probably never throw away if you're like 95% of fibre artists!) the little snippings of sewing thread:

The annoying frayings and unravellings you get after tearing fabric, like these organza threads:

Any odd or short bits of yarn, handmade, bought or even unpicked knitting:

Plus embroidery thread, string, twine, tassels off the end of scarves and any other bits of thread or yarn you have left over after constructing or deconstructing anything fibre related :)

Wall Hanging/Raggy Table Rug

A few weeks ago, my mum was talking about getting her bedroom redecorated. I'd been struggling to think of what to get her for her birthday, so this gave me an opportunity. I casually asked about the colours and she said she wasn't sure because she wanted to match the paint to the wallpaper she was having on one wall, luckily, she knew what the wallpaper was called, so after she left, I looked it up:

My first thought was to try to convince her to have the nice blue and brown version! But, I resisted and downloaded the picture. Then I opened it in Photoshop and tried to pick out all the colours and made an image with a few stripes in the various shades:

Then I printed out the sample and stripes and started to plan a wall hanging for her new room. I wanted something soft, texturey, not too neat. 'Raggy' is the best word to describe what I was after, I think. I spent a couple of days making blended batts in the shades I wanted. Then I spent a few days making twists of wool and fibres and also spun some 'arty' yarns for the piece. Unfortunately none of the photos I took came out :(  but when I'd finished making them there were at least 150 lengths of wool, commercial art yarns and fibres twisted or spun together. I laid out a couple of layers of wool tops, then carefully added all the twists where I wanted them. I had to take my table outside to felt it because it was so big and I knew I'd make a mess.

This is a close up of it with the netting on:

And a peek under the netting:

It didn't take as long as I thought it might for it to felt, probably because it took so long to make sure it was all thoroughly wetted! This is when it was all wet down and starting to felt.

And this is the finished piece:

I knew as soon as it was dried that my mum would want it as some kind of rug/mat and the first thing she said was 'Oh, this is going on top of my drawers, it'll be perfect.' Some of the yarns I made were by plying handspun merino with commercial yarns, but mostly I just plied half thick, half thin merino together. Closer view of the middle:

Here are some commercial boucle yarns, one twisted in on the left and the one I laid on top is mohair from Marilyn, I think. There are a couple of my yarns in there too:

I'd forgotten I used some organza and cotton gauze in the twists too, you can just see a bit of organza here:

Yarny Texture:

 I thought a bit of colour might make a change from all the natural wools and fibres this week :)

Texture

I've been working on a project about using 'other' fibres in felting and noticed that 'texture' has been a common theme lately. I thought I'd post a collection of photos showing different textures from wet felted pieces I've made.

This is a green organza used as a base:

This is the top, strips of organza over blocks of coloured Merino:

This is another organza base, a slightly stiffer gold:

This is a piece of cerise organza:

This is a close up of silk in textured nuno felting:

This is a blue-green piece of textured felt, made with lots of layers and inclusions and felted mostly in the washing machine:

And lastly, this is a piece of texture felt using reds, pinks, oranges and yellow shades:

Do you have any photos of textural felt? How do you like to create it? Do you like to add to your felt to create texture with stitch or other fabrics and fibres? I'd love to see photos of your work :)