The deadline is getting close and I need to get done. As Jan will tell you soon it was Fiberfest weekend in Almonte. a small town close to where we live. I was on the demo team for Sunday. So I planned to work on the shepherdess and sheep as my demo project. First I had to get the shepherdess some clothes. Not too hard you think or at least I thought.
I forgot to take starting pictures but here is the shirt and skirt ready for final fulling.
And this is the shrinkage after fulling
The skirt was fine but the shirt was way too stiff. so I made another using a lot less wool and felted it along with the cloak.
For the cloak, I decided to use some prefelt I had. I cut the first side a little bigger than the resist then folded it around and basted it into place. This seemed like the best idea to keep everything in place.
And here it is shrunk
I liked it and it fit well except for the hood. I didn’t like it at all. I thought for the hood I wanted, it would be best to do it separately. do more cutting and sewing. and shirt number 4. I don’t remember what was wrong with shirt 2 but shirt 3 would have been good if I hadn’t cut the neck too big.
And finally, all the parts of the clothing are dry and ready to move on to the next steps.
For the next post, I hope to have the shepherdess all done and a colourful flock of sheep for her to tend.
I went to our annual art retreat over Labor Day weekend (Aug. 30 – Sep. 1) at the Kiwanis Lodge at Little Bitterroot Lake near Marion, MT (USA). Luckily my husband is a Kiwanian so we are able to use this lodge once a year. I got there a bit early and while waiting for the others to join me, I took a few photos and gave Edgar a swimming lesson.
This is the lodge, this side faces the lake. The weather was perfect, sunny and warm, no smoke (August is usually fire season around here) but cold enough at night to need a fire in the fireplace.
Here’s a view of the lake. Even on a holiday weekend, the lake wasn’t busy and we even saw 8 loons swimming about. Edgar, my dog, has short legs and a very dense body. He’s not overweight but weighs fourty pounds. When he has tried to swim in the past, he had a really hard time keeping his head above water. He just sinks. So we bought him a life jacket and I took it with us to the lake. (Edgar got to go to the retreat for the first time because hubby was going to Missoula for a UM football game.)
After a few tries, he got the hang of it and was eager to have me throw the stick so he could swim out to get it. Needless to say, Edgar had a good weekend.
Our main art activity this weekend was indigo dyeing. Both Paula and Louise set up an indigo pot on Friday and then we dyed various fabric, clothing etc. on Saturday. Here you can see the two indigo pots and some clamped fabric soaking in water in the pink bucket.
Louise (left) is putting her first piece of fabric into the dye vat and Paula (right) is getting rid of the “bloom” on the top of her indigo pot before dyeing. I have personally never made an indigo pot but they used the directions that are available on Dharma Trading Co.
Here Louise (left) is explaining to Sally (right) about how to use the indigo pot and getting her fabric ready to put in the vat.
The coolest thing about indigo, in my opinion, is that it comes out of the dye pot green and then when it hits the air and oxidizes, it turns blue. The longer you leave the fabric in the dye bath, the more blue it will end up.
Here are a few pieces drying on the grass. The one on the right was rust dyed first and then put into the indigo.
Paula brought some clamps and different shapes of wood, which once clamped on the fabric, resist the indigo. You can see the results of some of those in the right hand photo.
It was a wonderful weekend and we enjoyed some gorgeous sunsets while sitting out on the porch.
For those of you who wish they belonged to an art group (felting group or whatever), my suggestion is to start your own group. If you meet someone who might be interested, ask them to join a group. All the people in your group don’t have to be felt makers. You can learn so much from creative people who enjoy other media. So don’t be shy, just ask others that you know or meet and start up a group of your own. That’s what I did and now more than ten years later, we are still going strong.
There’s a proverb I like: “necessity is the mother of invention”. Apparently it started with Plato. I’m going to test it today in two ways. Firstly, I’ve had a lot of sales and exhibitions recently and I haven’t made much new work. I’m writing this while stewarding an exhibition. So, as my blog is due and I’ve nothing new to show you (necessity), I’m drawing on some work I did earlier in the year and reflecting on that (invention). Secondly, it was actually the need to create a lot of pictures quickly (necessity) that led me down the different style of pictures (invention) that I’m going to talk about.
As I’ve covered in previous blogs, I had a large exhibition to fill in April/May this year so had a big push from January to March to make lots of new pictures. As all wet felters will know, wet felting is not a quick process and there’s no mileage in trying to hurry it. So, as well as making my usual style of pictures, I had a think about the quickest felt pictures I could make while not skimping on the quality of the felting. Quicker pictures would also allow me to offer them at a slightly lower price than my other work.
Nuno felting (which is including fabric in felt) with patterned fabric is a quick way of creating colour and pattern as it bypasses complicated and time-consuming wool layout. And now that I can print onto felt (again covered in a previous blog) that’s a comparatively quick way of introducing images.
This was my first picture.
“Monochrome Tree #1”
The fabric was a lovely fine wool scarf that I had bought (as always) in a charity shop. I have the solid beech frames made for me in batches in advance so I knew what size I was aiming for. I used a commercial prefelt of merino wool and silk – again trying to minimise the layout time and it’s also lovely to work with. There are plenty of legitimate, free-to-use images on the internet. Sourcing, scaling, printing and transferring them to felt is quite time consuming, especially as I only planned on using each tree once for this first set of pictures, but I’m sure I will come back to them.
Monochrome Tree #2Monochrome Tree #3
For the next (and subsequent) ones I decided to make them slightly smaller than the frames, leaving a small border around the felt. I added a line of recycled tapestry wool at the top of the fabric, just because I liked the look of it, and decided against patterning the sky.
I then fished out some black and white silk scarves from my charity shop finds and used those instead of the wool scarf.
Monochrome Tree #4 with crowMonochrome Tree #5
I added a crow silhouette in the tree on the left picture. A bit fiddly but I liked it.
Monochrome Tree #6 Two TreesMonochrome Tree #7
My next experiment was to switch from black and white to coloured silk, tapestry wool and trees.
Green Tree #1Green Tree #2
When I was printing on Green Tree #1 I accidentally pressed a fold in the corner. It came out with a hot iron but I didn’t remember to photograph it again afterwards.
After I’d made these two, it occurred to me that I could double the width of the wool and fabric to make two pictures at the same time, cutting them apart before printing on the trees. Why hadn’t I thought of that sooner? Super-speedy.
Continuing with the limited colour palate, I chose a silk scarf that was red / orange with some colour fade across the scarf.
After felting and before printing
When the felting was finished I wasn’t sure I liked how much the white fibres showed through the red / orange silk. The previous fabrics had either been partly white or were light coloured so the movement of the white wool and silk fibres through the fabric had been less visible.
As I contemplated this, I decided that I liked the long rectangular shape for a change. I happened to have some frames that were more or less the same shape and proportions….and so “Red Trees” became a double-width landscape with two trees.
“Red Trees”
That wasn’t where I thought I was heading but it’s fun to take an unexpected turn,
I have now sold more than half of these pictures, and I’d say they’ve sold slightly better than other work. I’m a little ambivalent about this. I like the new pictures but I don’t feel as much for them as my usual bird, beach and/or water pictures. I suppose that shouldn’t matter. They have definitely attracted a slightly different audience. When I get back into the studio I will be making some more. Not because of their speed as I’m not now under the same pressure, but because people seem to like them and I’ve enjoyed trying something new. I think I will stick to the monochrome fabrics but try out some different colours. Having a group of different strong colours like the red and green might make a good display.
And so, it seems, on this occasion, that necessity was indeed the mother of invention. I made a new line of work and I have a blog to post!
One of my best customers for my 3D-printed felting tools, a fellow felt teacher in the US, asked if I could make a smaller version of the wand tool for making jewellery. I had previously investigated making the wand longer and narrower towards the tip but the tips kept breaking, I don’t make a lot of jewellery or small items so the idea was abandoned.
I mentioned the request to Mr TB who suggested a couple of possible solutions for the fragile tips. He printed 2 of them for me and I have been testing them this week. I may be biased but think they are pretty good, I have been using them quite aggressively and they are still in tact and working as I had hoped.
For the tests I decided to make set of felted rings. Normally I use a bundle of pencils held together with an elastic band but this maker pen with a tapered barrel came to hand first. Pencils / pens are ideal because you can alter the size of your ring by adding more pencils to the bundle, then remove them one by one as the felt fulls and the ring shrinks down.
Wrapping wool around the pen before adding soapy water and gently rubbingOnce the felt was starting to shrink I transferred the ring to the tool and fulled the inside of the ringThis is how much the ring shrank, the inside of the ring was wide enough to stretch around the widest part of the pen at the startLooking for more pens to make a larger ring I came across this beaker instead…
I made a small felted ball to finish the set and make a pendant, which layout do you like best?
The fulling tool just needs a couple of minor tweaks and a name (any ideas?), another round of testing and it will be ready to join the others.
Apologies for the poor quality of these photos, they were taken in my current studio (the garage) and the light in there is awful. The new studio is coming along well though. Another month and the floor will be tiled, the kitchenette and shelving installed and all my fluff moved from the garage to its new home 🙂
The rest of the reno is progressing too, our new kitchen is half installed, the bathrooms and deck are nearly finished and this week the builders are putting in a retaining wall.
The house and garden 2 years agoThe house and garden this week – spot the difference?The studio with new deck
In between painting and moving garden plants I have not had much time for felting so have been getting my “fix” through teaching…
A private, beginners bag class…
These ladies know how to felt in style – home made G&Ts! 🙂
Mosaic felting at the Auckland Creative Fibre retreat…
I also had the pleasure of teaching a felted pod class in collaboration with Deaf Aotearoa last month but I’m afraid I forgot to take any photos. This was a wonderful experience and I have no hesitation in recommending teaching this way if you get the opportunity, most of the participants could lip read but we also had a sign language interpreter with us. The hardest part for me, was trying not to talk while demonstrating, I am so used to explaining what I am doing with my hands I had to keep checking myself to explain first, so everyone could watch the interpreter and then demonstrate with the wool.
As you saw, this year there was a reasonable distribution of different vendors for weavers, spinners, sewers/Quilters and yarn for knitting and crochet. for felters I only found one that had felt things (boots and slippers) and two that had tools and one had needles.
DEMOS At TWIST
At 1:45 pm, I arranged with the workshop people to get a table and a couple of chairs for our demo space. it was the best spot for demoing, right outside the main arena, where everyone would pass. Since there was no demo box, which had tablecloths and other demo supplies, I was left with whatever I had in the car and the felt pieces I had brought to choose from, as a display. I went back out to the car, to drop off shopping (we will look at that later) and see what I had to work with. I found an old sign I had made for the carp fair in 2017. (No idea why it was still in the car) It was in a plastic sleeve, on card stock. It had our web address, a bit of info about workshops and our name. OK, signage covered? I have a number of lightweight black car blankets to cover stuff in the back of the car, which will work to cover the table. I also grabbed the bag of felt pictures, the bag of wool I had brought to work from, and 2 of the braids I just purchased. With the walker loaded, I rolled back through the rain, off to set up a demo.
As I was setting up I had people dropping their stuff on the table, to get organized before going out in the rain. So I only used 2 of the black blankets to allow space at the end of the table, in case more people needed to prep for the weather. I set up all the felting I had brought and pulled out the Dragon hand (more about that even later too!) to add the first colour layer. I didn’t actually get much done on that, but I had a steady stream of questions about felt pictures, sculptures, armatures, needles and wool.
French was my favourite class up to grade 7 when our new teacher decided to teach us to read and write in French. I was very optimistic and had a working hypothesis, that I was enthusiastically testing; maybe I am not dyslexic in French! That did not work out as well as I had hoped and was proven to be a false hypothesis. While I was enjoying French, my English teacher was not. It seems my English spelling worsened and I was kicked out of French, by my English teacher….. I have since lost most of the vocabulary I had acquired before my ignominious removal.
So I was very pleased when another guild member dropped by at the end of her shopping as she waited for a friend to finish a workshop she was in. She had a sweet little support spindle and fibre to demonstrate spinning and spoke French! She was able to chat with many more of the people who stopped and was able to answer their questions or translate what I said. I was so happy that she was there to help! By the time she left, the crowd had decreased and I was able to chat with most of the remaining people.
This was a great spot and I hope they will ask us back next year.
It was very busy, and these pictures, as I set up, were the only ones I got during the demo.
The demo spaces at the end of Friday are all ready for the Saturday demo teams.
10.1- 10.3) Demoing Friday afternoon, demo space at 6 pm, and Sunday demo teams
Now should we check and see if we bought the same things during shopping? What did you select?
On Friday: I found 7 Braids of combed top, most were BFL, Targi and a Romni cross in deep tones. Many were dyed over grey wool. 2 large top whirl 3-D printed drop spindles, I was crossing my fingers there would be a few remaining on Sunday since they spun like a dream, holding their spin for an extended period of time. In the top picture (10.4) you will notice I found the Collingwood tablet weaving book I was about to order, and beside it is a mysterious cardboard box! That is holding my new battery, it will make my EEW6 spinning wheel free of electric plugs!! I had purchased a bag of these locks before and liked them enough to get 2 more bags this year! I was intrigued by a breed discovery pack from World of Wool (I was inspired by the upcoming workshop on Sunday), a green batt, a small bag of cashmere from the Black Lamb, and a small bag of grey/silver silk that may wind up on the dragon hand.
On Sunday after the workshop, I finished my shopping. First I was off to find 2 more of the spindles I had liked so much, then off to look at a couple more braids of combed top. (Batts are easier to needle felt but the colours!!! I could not help myself!!!) Yes, I did cave and get a braid with Merino, bamboo and silk, it was the colour! and it will likely hang out with one of the spinning wheels. I found 2 twist angle guilds for the spinning wheels to share. I went back to get info on how to hook the battery up to the electric spinning wheel and also got an extra parts bag, just because I had not seen them available anywhere and it’s good to have spare parts when you need them. Lastly, I also found something for Ann, she has been looking for one for a while but she will tell you about the item in the paper bag (no it isn’t a knotty nostepinne!!)
Although my shopping skills are not up to Carlene’s ability, I did try my best! I hope your vicarious shopping has inspired your next felting, spinning or weaving project!
Thanks to Glenn for carrying loot and wheels on Sunday (he did not shop, since there was a serious lack of blacksmithing related items at the fibre festival, maybe he will have more luck next year? He did enjoy a nice day of reading a book.)
Still to come: Twist 2024; Part 3 – Breed Study Workshop, but first a quick trip to an impressive tapestry exhibit! that will be for next week! Have a wonderful long weekend for those who are partaking!!
For the next post, I hope to have the shepherdess all done and a colourful flock of sheep for her to tend.
10.1- 10.3) Demoing Friday afternoon, demo space at 6 pm, and Sunday demo teams
