Collage – Felting and Fiber Studio

Anyone for Kinusaiga – a crash course?

June 19, 2026 helenefeltzen Comments 22 comments

Recently, a friend of mine mentioned that she was heading to a class to explore Joomchi. It is something that I would be interested in learning about but I have enough rabbit holes in my life at the moment. Curious (for future reference) I asked about the venue and headed online to check it out. I was scrolling through the lovely website and I came across a different course, one offering a three hour session on Kinusaiga. The photos of the finished work were really attractive but I got a bit of a shock when I saw the cost, which I considered prohibitive to most people. So out of principle, I decided to give it a miss. But my curiosity was roused at that stage so I googled the term and found many videos on YouTube. I can’t attribute my new knowledge to just one of these videos as presenters had their own view of what to look out for when making Kinusaiga. So this post is an amalgamation of my learning from my short visit into the rabbit hole.

Kinusaiga originated in Japan and is a form of fabric collage. It is a great way to use up fabric scraps and I found the whole process quite meditative and enjoyable. The process involves drawing a simple pattern which is transferred onto a foam block which has been covered in double sided sticky paper. Each section of the design is treated as a pattern piece which is used as a basis for a shape cut from fabric. You add on extra fabric to the shape to allow for tucking into the foam block so that none of the raw edges are showing. The sticky background holds everything in place. I think it’s probably easier to explain if I go through it step by step. I improvised with my materials as I wanted to produce my picture from stuff I already had. This might suit but you can buy kits online – I checked some out but I found them very expensive for what was on offer.

Materials:

Foam board – I used leftover scraps from the board I use when I am framing pieces but thicker is ideal if you have it to hand as there is less likelihood that you will pierce the back of the board.
2 sided sticky paper. One side will stick to the board and one side to your fabric to keep it in place. I used some 2 sided sticky tape that I had left over from sticking down a floor rug.
Craft knife.
Metal nail file (one with a pointy end) or sharp small scissors (like an embroidery scissors).
Paper and pencil (for drawing your pattern)
Marker (for example a Sharpie pen) to outline your final drawing.
Fabric scraps (I used fabric I had left over from my mask making days of the early 2020’s)
2 Scissors one for paper and one for fabric cutting.
2 sided selotape

The how to:

Step 1

Sketch a very simple design being mindful that each outline is going to become a cutout. I used a two sided felted mobile that I made some years ago as my starting point:

*My inspiration was based off a felted mobile I made some time ago*

Here is my outline:

*simple recreation of the chosen design*

Step 2

Now number each section that you are going to cut out and take a photo of this for reference:

*Here I numbered all the pieces and took a photo for reference*

Step 3

Stick the two sided sticky paper or tape to the foam board, leaving the protective cover on the top layer of the paper/tape (I did not take a photo of this but you can see it in the next photo)

Step 4

Place the drawing on top of your covered foam board and secure. Cut through each of the shapes using your craft knife. Be careful with the knife and make sure it pierces through the sticky paper/tape and through the foam BUT that it does not pierce the back side of the foam board. Set aside each of the cut pieces of your design (now you can see why it is helpful to number them).

The drawing was secured on the foam and each section was cut out
with an imprint left on the foam block

Step 5

Choose fabrics from your stash that you feel will look pleasing together

photo

Step 6

Start cutting out your shapes making sure that you allow extra fabric so that you can push this down the side of the corresponding cut in the foam board. Remove the cover off the sticky paper/tape (my tape was blue so it is easy to see this in the photo)

*Inserting the first shape (the blue is the sticky tape)*

Step 7

Align your shape so that you have enough fabric to push down the side of the foam board. Use your metal nail file or your small scissors to do this. Carefully trim off any excess if you find that the allowance is too big.

Be sure to work methodically when securing the fabric. It makes it easier to complete and you can see your picture build up, which is nice. I was unhappy with one of my fabric choices when I laid them down initially so I was able to change them – the materials were very forgiving. One of the photos has an arrow on it to show where I changed my mind about a particular fabric.

first piece inserted
building the picture

Step 8

Finally secure the overhang at the side of your picture to the back with double sided sticky tape. Add a frame if you fancy. My fabrics were chosen at random from the stash so are a tad garish. It’s far from perfect but not too bad for a first try. Also, looking at the last photo I see I could have ironed some of the fabric before I used them, but sometimes it is good for me to leave precision behind and just go have fun.

I hope this is a project you will try. It is fun, mindful and quick to complete. Let me know what you think and be sure to post your work so that we can include them in the gallery.

Helene x

Nuno felted dyed landscape with sheer green "hills", sheer purple/maroon trees and blue sheer for sky. Stitching and trimming completed around edge to hold everything in place.

Watercolors in Nuno Felt

February 22, 2026 ruthlane Comments 16 comments

I have been continuing with my experiments with trying to create a “watercolor” effect in nuno felt. I decided to take a few of the pieces that were the least successful with the dye/paint application and add more. The first addition of “more” is with sheer fabrics.

This is the piece I decided to start with. It had lost a lot of its color and still looked like a landscape but I felt it could do with “more”.

I started with adding in some torn tulle trees on the right hand side.

Then I took some sheer green fabric and added it on the left to give a feel of hills in the background. Some of these steps might be hard to see as the fabric is very sheer but it’s the layering that achieves the final effect.

I then cut off the left edge of the green sheer and added it back into the “hill” area. This gives a bit of value change as you add further layers of sheer.

After looking at the tulle trees as compared to the green sheer on the left, I decided to change the trees. Since the background was mainly yellow, I thought the addition of purple/maroon trees would give a neutralized tree color but still feel there was additional color added. That seemed better so I added in the shadows too. I added a bit of the purple/maroon on the left for a bit of foreground in front of the green hills.

Next up was to try and change the “straight line” over the trees on the right. It felt too abrupt a change in color. So I added a couple of layers of light blue sheer over the trees and then a full piece of blue sheer over the entire piece.

The next step was looking over the piece to see anything else that stood out. I noticed that the green sheer I had on the left needed a little work. It felt too straight along the bottom and there was a weird kind of ‘flag’ in the middle of the hills. So I changed those and then began stitching. It’s hard to see but there is light yellow stitching in the foreground. That wasn’t meant to add a hard line, just to hold the blue fabric down and keep the smaller sheer pieces underneath in place. I did add a broken darker brown horizon line which you can see I have started on the left.

I continued adding stitch to the horizon line as well as the sky. Again, in the sky, I didn’t want a hard line so I used a very light gray thread, not pure white that might “stick” out too much.

The final step was to make very small stitches all around the edges of the piece to hold everything in place. I am happy with the result, a bit more color but still an abstract, dreamy effect.

Altered Books – A Glimpse Inside

September 21, 2025 ruthlane Comments 6 comments

In my last post, I showed you how we finished up the binding on our altered books. I didn’t manage to get photos of Louise’s book as she was still working on adding to her inner pages. Sorry, Louise. Here are the inside photos of the rest of the books.

This first book is Paula’s and this is the back cover. This is her bird’s nest; part of her theme was birds. She had picked several words to base her pages on when she was creating the book.

Here’s a page inside Paula’s book with a painting of a magpie.

Paula has a bunch of antique photos that she used throughout the book. She also has some wonderful antique papers which you will see in all of our books as she is so generous.

These are some of the mini landscapes that Paula painted.

And another of Paula’s photos with stitched leaves.

Now on to Sally’s book. This is her cover and Sally is planning on adding to her inside pages but hasn’t completed that yet.

Here’s Sally’s end paper on the left. Perhaps you can see the dark brown fabric where she stitched her signatures? The first page is from some old music sheets that Paula gave us.

Sally has a mix of different kind of papers in her signatures just waiting for her addition of eco printed paper and fabric.

Altered book with handmade paper including raw fibers and stained paper.

Altered book with music sheet and stained paper.

Here are a couple of other examples of the type of paper that Sally used in her book signatures.

This is the inside cover of my book. I didn’t want to take out this lovely map from the original end papers. So I left it the way it was. I then glued my end paper to cover where the signature had been glued in on the back side of the right page shown here. The map is what is stopping me from putting holes in the front cover to stitch some embroidery.

Here is the end paper on the left that covers the glued binding. This piece of paper was screen printed with the deconstructed screening technique. It was my original inspiration for the color scheme for the book. You will have seen the fabric on the right if you read my prior post about how we printed the “backwards” writing.

Here’s another one of my pages. The addition of extra paper in the signatures splits up some of the page spreads that I made but to me it adds some interest. I am thinking about adding some poems and quotes about trees on some of the blank pages.

This page spread in my book shows the back side of one of the book pages that I didn’t change and an old ledger paper from Paula. If you didn’t see all my page spreads that I created for this book, you can see them here and here. Most of them made the cut for the final book layout.

I really enjoyed creating this book and I’m looking forward to the project that we will work on in the coming year with my art group. We don’t have a plan as of yet but I’m sure we will come up with something!

Book page spread collaged with various elements.

More Altered Tree Book Pages

July 21, 2025 ruthlane Comments 11 comments

My altered tree book is moving along slowly. I made a few more pages and used some of my scraps from the word printing experiment.

I try to keep some page spreads that already have gesso on them so that I can sit down anytime to create a few collaged spreads. The one on the middle left is gessoed with clear gesso that Paula uses. I just have the white gesso so most of my pages will be covered first with that.

I then added some walnut ink to tone down the whiteness of the page. I decided to add walnut ink to the edges of one of my miniature paintings too. It definitely helps to tone down the white edges for this project.

Then I have a bag full of scraps and papers in my chosen colorway. It’s fun putting the mark making and other papers together.

The eco printed leaf is one that Paula did and gave to me.

I was much happier with the miniature landscape once the edge was no longer white. The words are a poem about trees.

The old “papers” are such a great addition to the book.

I found this “tree” on the right that I had made but not used in a different collage. It’s made from printed black paper. I finally used my original color inspiration in this spread.

Here’s another one with the screen printed inspiration paper and some mark making from the word experiments.

I have to figure out how I am going to make my signatures. For those of you who don’t make books, a signature is a group of papers that are stitched into the binding in one “piece”. I don’t think I will have all the pages filled. I will leave a bunch of blank pages so that I can draw or write or make marks in the book later. I am also planning on adding some fabric pages into the book. Then those can be stitched when inspiration strikes.

Completed page spread for altered book about trees.

Altered Tree Book Page Spreads

June 11, 2025 ruthlane Comments 18 comments

I have been slowly working on my tree book and got a few more pages completed. You can read about the beginnings if you missed it here and here.

I start with pages from the old tree book that have been gessoed and then painted or dyed. I used walnut ink on most of the pages but I decided I would try the tumeric ink we made a couple of years ago. That was so bright yellow, I added a layer of walnut ink and it is still candescent. I will have to cover up most of the yellow so I don’t overwhelm the book with so much yellow. I have a pile of painted papers and some of the mark making we have been doing over the last 3-4 months.

Then I move bits around until I am happy with the outcome. You can see that I tried adding my little landscapes that I painted recently but I didn’t end up using them. They didn’t feel right to me, most likely because of the very white borders.

Here’s one of the pages before I glued things down. The yellow and black paper are shreds left over from our paper layering experiments.

Here’s a finished page spread. You can see the same paper layering end product on the right. This is the candescent yellow background page. It has been toned down by layering tissue paper over it.

Here’s one that I used one of Paula’s eco prints on the right. It was perfect for my color scheme. The left reminds me of a feather but it is torn paper that accidentally turned out that shape.

Here’s another layered paper one with some other off cuts and mark making.

And here’s the layout I showed you above once it was glued. I like how the tissue paper allows you to see through to the original book page. I am enjoying the imprecise nature of this book and playing with mark making, color and shapes.

Paper Layering Experiment

May 12, 2025 ruthlane Comments 14 comments

My local group had another “play” day and we created some layered paper experiments. We got the idea from this video. I immediately thought it would give a good texture for representing bark and we decided to give it a try.

It’s a really easy process. Start with a background paper and then add layers of string and thin paper with matte medium glueing them together. By using different values and colors of paper, you can get an interesting look. We used painted tissue paper that we already had in our stash.

Layers of different colors of paper and string glued together with matte medium.

You can put as many layers as you would like but remember to leave the strings coming out the edges so that you can pull them once everything is dry. You also need to try and figure out what strings are the top layers and pull each layer of your strings as you work down. Use different thicknesses of string and thread and it gives different looks once the strings are pulled out.

Here’s one of mine when it was finished and drying.

And here are both of mine once dried completely. It took about 24 hours to dry completely.

Then you gently tear the strings out or rip them out. It helps to hold the paper around the string as you go so you don’t pull off too much paper. But you can’t really control what tears so it is very organic looking when you’re finished.

Here’s one of the results that Louise achieved.

Paula was very productive and took her photos with a matte around the pieces.

Here are my two pieces. I left the curly bits and they are quite textured.

You can see how textured with this close up angled photo. This was a fun process and gave interesting results. Now I have a few more pieces to add to my book.

Keeping out of mischief!

April 20, 2025 helenefeltzen Comments 14 comments

Between exhibitions and challenges, I have been busy for the past few months – at least it kept me out of trouble. I thought I might present some of the pieces to you here.

Just by way of background, I am a member of a small group of feltmakers. At any time, there are a maximum of 10 in the group and the group is called Unperfect 10. I recently learned the reason for the name. It is in recognition that all members are very ambitious but far from perfect. I like the name even more now that I know its history. We meet online every six weeks and we agree a theme for a challenge, the result of which we present at our next get together. Although the theme changes each time, the weight stays the same. The piece we present should weigh 10 grams. It’s not always that easy to weigh in at exactly 10 grams (perhaps that is another reason why our group is called the Unperfect 10!)

So far, we have met three times this year. The theme for our January meeting was ‘Home’. Members’ interpretations were very personal. For me, home revolves around the kitchen. It is the place for gatherings, happiness and informality. This I represented in a cup of tea. Unfortunately I cannot find my original resist but I have drawn one here to give you an idea what it looked like. I laid out the orange fibre on the cup, the handle and just inside the rim and the laid the white and light brown fibre on the upper dome to represent the tea. I then added the circles on the cup as decorations. I felted and fulled the cup, cutting a hole in the base of the cup to remove the resist. I turned the dome top to the inside of the cup, shaped and finished it off. Here are photos of the result.

rough sketch of the concept
View of the cup
I’ll have a half cup!
View inside my cup of tea!

Our meeting in February required a little more planning. The theme was ‘Carnival’ and each member had to make a prefelt for another member and post it on to them. This prefelt then was used as the main fabric for our creations. Once finished, the piece was posted back to the person who made the prefelt. After a lot of research, I decided to make a colourful version of the Venetian Moretta mask. While in its day, the Moretta mask had other connotations (think Dangerous Liaisons) I was attracted to the button or ball which was attached to the back of the mask as it stopped women from talking, something I felt was pertinent in many societies today. I included curls on the mask – this was a ‘nod’ to the Romans who are believed to have invented carnival, although it was a different affair back then. I used part of the prefelt I received, added some extra fibre, margillan silk and, of course, a button.

Front view of the carnival themed moretta mask.
Side view of the mask. The Curls are a reference to Roman sculptures.
The back of the mask. I added margillan silk and, of course the button!

We had our third meeting in early April. The theme this time was a little more challenging as we worked from a number of words. M.C. Escher; Optical Illusion; Tessellations; Black and White fibre; 3D Sculpture; Resist; Template; Stencil. All of which had to be completed in a 10g presentation! M.C. Escher was a Dutch Graphic artist and if you like you can find out more about his work here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M._C._Escher

I found a section of an Escher piece that I liked and got to work. First, I made my pattern which comprised three identical diamond shapes that made up a cube. Then I made three different colour prefelts (Black/White/Grey) which I then cut out and made into 25 joined cubes (75 pieces). These were then felted together. Once dried and shaped, I stiffened the piece and mounted it on pins in a box frame. The optical illusion is the 3D effect, especially when it is viewed in the frame:

My inspiration: Portion of MC Escher’s artwork ‘Cycle’
Checking the diamond shapes
Checking the layout of the prefelts
prefelts are ready for felting!
Altogether Cubes weighed in at 9.65g
Another side view of the cubes. I removed the glass as it was causing too much shine!
Cubes front view. The shadowing can be seen here.
View 3: walking around the piece
Side view of the cubes. It is pinned into the backing

I also had two pieces in exhibitions during March. The first was a live exhibition which was run by my local felting guild, Feltmakers Ireland. The guild is very well run and there is always something happening in it. If you are based in Ireland, it is well worth joining. The theme of the exhibition was “Symbols of Ireland” and I chose the Irish dry stone wall which was recently formally recognized with its inclusion in UNESCO’s prestigious list of protected cultural heritage practices, and the native Galway breed sheep for my piece. Ireland’s dry stone walls have been around since the Neolithic period so I felt that it would fit the brief. The Galway sheep produce beautiful fleeces which are very versatile and can be used for spinning, weaving and of course felting.

I first had to design and build my wall on paper. Then I made lots of different shades of grey nuno prefelts which were cut to the shapes of the stone drawings. Once the wall was felted onto its background, I needle felted the sheep’s head so that it would add dimension to the piece. This was attached to the picture and then the main body was needle felted using Galway fibre. I made a variety of prefelts which I then cut into the shape of foliage and lichen. These were then needle felted onto the stones. Unfortunately I did not keep a record of my process but here is the result.

Irish dry stone wall with sheep
A close up of the 3D effect and nuno work
Another closeup showing 3D plants and lichen
The top of the wall with additions

My final piece was for the online exhibition of the International Feltmakers Association. The theme here was ‘Connections’ and I was not sure what I would do for this. One morning I woke up with the words ‘Chaos theory’ in my head. I knew I needed to investigate this. It led me to my chosen topic ‘The Butterfly Effect’. The butterfly effect suggests small actions can have massive, unpredictable consequences. In society, this idea highlights how individual decisions—like a single vote or a small act of kindness—can ripple through time, influencing social movements, global events, or personal lives, ultimately shaping broader cultural and political outcomes.

Lyn and Annie’s beautiful work with tree canopies provided me with the inspiration for the background of this piece. I have been looking up a lot more since reading their posts on the beauty of the tree canopy. My base was inspired by a photo I took in New Zealand some time ago. I then needle felted the butterfly and then wet felted it. I wanted to be able to manipulate its wings so I added a light wiring to the back of the wings. I then decided that the tree canopy deserved a different perspective – what did we do as kids when looking up at the sky? I remember spinning around. So my square picture became a circle. I attached the butterfly by needle felting it securely to the picture but I also secured it to the felt backing to give it added dimension:

My inspiration. Taken in Auckland NZ last year
The tree canopy is laid out
close up of the felted butterfly
Checking possibilities for butterfly placement
I decided to cut the background into a circle. This gave me freedom to hang at any angle!
Closeup of the 3D butterfly

I hope you enjoyed my little ‘retrospective’. I would love to hear about what you have been working on over the past few months.

Just a little reminder: Registration will open shortly for my wet felted hanging spiral workshop which will begin on 2nd May. Please feel free to click here if you would like to find out more.

Playing with Book Pages

April 12, 2025 ruthlane Comments 15 comments

I have been playing around with different techniques and creating a few book pages for the book I’m repurposing that I showed you here. This is another book that will be added to over a long period of time and these pages may change as I go along or might stay the same. Who knows? I’m going to make a bunch of pages and then put them together at some point. Some might not get used or torn up and used on something else. It is a fluid type process that is ongoing.

Our play with alcohol ink left me with pieces of colored tape to use and so I taped them down to a page spread from the repurposed book. You can still see most of the page underneath and it gives an interesting. Very shiny though, which isn’t my favorite look. It seems a bit overwhelming all on one page so this might get cut up into smaller pieces but for now, I left it as is.

I had gotten a free trial from Golden paints of Light Dimensional Ground that I wanted to try. I painted it on the book page first and then added some different natural inks over top of it. The ground is supposed to be used to be a surface for watercolor paints on surfaces that don’t accept watercolor paint well. It is clear when dry and gives a bit rougher surface than regular paper. It worked well with the ink as it didn’t soak into the paper the same way it usually would. Then I added some other pieces of collage and a small painting on a ledger page.

This is just one page as opposed to a spread. This page is gessoed first then painted with acrylic and ink. Next I printed with a small stamp that reminds me of tree rings and added another small ledger painting.

This last spread has the undercoating of Light Dimensional Ground and then ink. On the right page, I added a couple of layers of painted tissue that was part of our mark making session.

You might notice that I am sticking to a color scheme this time, more neutral than my last book. Sticking to the tree theme though, I can’t seem to help that. It’s my favorite subject if you couldn’t tell.

Nuno felted landscape background with fabrics added for background horizon and tree shapes.

Grove of Trees – Part Two

January 22, 2025 ruthlane Comments 12 comments

I’m working on my grove of trees nuno landscape slowly. I think that some of you may think that this is a “find the difference” in the photos as they look pretty similar. But this is how I work, I add something, take a photo, look at the photo to see if it works, then add something else etc. That means there may be only one small difference from photo to photo, maybe I took something off, maybe I added something.

I had the background “horizon” and the large dark tree on the left when I left off. Now to add more trees. There are three little lines added on. These are the folded edges/hems of the nylon scarves I use to add layers of color. I usually just cut them off and don’t use them but I thought they might work for background trees. I tried maroon, yellow and orange. Not exactly what I wanted.

Then I added a mid tone grey one. I liked that better as it pushed the line further into the distance.

I added more mid tone grey trunks and moved the orange one closer to the “sun”. That looked better.

The I added a few more orange ones keeping them on the right hand side where the light is coming in.

I wanted to use more of the silk organza for a few more bigger trunks in the mid ground to foreground.

And a couple more smaller ones in the same deep red color. I was happy with how it was coming along.

Here I have added a few white “branches” to see what that would look like. I am inspired by Wolf Kahn’s tree paintings and was looking at several that showed white marks to denote branches like in this painting. I would need a lot more of the white lines to give the same effect. I will be pondering on that idea a while yet.

I decided I didn’t want to add too many layers without starting to stitch down the under layers. So I stitched the darker “horizon” background down to the nuno felt. Now I need to stitch the skinny trees down. I still need to figure out the foreground and there will be more layers of fabric on the larger trees. Still a long way to go. But I’m happy with my progress.

Inspired by nature – part 2

June 26, 2024 Antje Comments 22 comments

In my previous post I had completed two nature inspired collages https://feltingandfiberstudio.com/2024/03/28/inspired-by-nature-part-1/ and had then decided (in my infinite wisdom!) to create a third and form a set. Collages one and two were partners, now I was heading for a family!

A second work including a found twig, fabric snippets and embroidery stitches — 2 My second piece

As I was now creating a ‘triptych’ – meaning the two different nature inspired collages needed to be tied together – I had to concentrate on colour and texture, because I didn’t have enough snippets of all the various fabrics previously used. At the same time, I needed to think about the design direction.

One of the hardest decisions was deciding which way up, I finally wanted to present collages one and two, as this would have a bearing on three. When doing abstract work, I usually work from different directions so that, to me, it is balanced from all sides. This enables me, or a client, to decide which way to hang the piece, or simply present the opportunity to ring the changes!

Design sketches and potential fabric pieces to be used — 3 Thinking about the design

the final auditioning of fabrics — 4 Auditioning the fabrics

Once I’d decided on the final hanging direction of collages one and two, the next hurdle was the actual design layout. Again, the priority for me, was to unify and compliment the previous finished pieces, for which my various sketches proved very useful.

I’ve been asked many times ‘where do you get your layout ideas from?’ Zimples…I look through my vast collection of images that I find interesting (landscape, architectural, food etc), then finding one I like, I either trace or freehand copy the main shapes. These then become the kicking off point. I’m repeating myself I know, as I’ve mentioned all this before….I just want to get the message over that this method is available to everyone – whether they are ‘arty’ or say they can’t draw for toffee!

Fabrics finally chosen and laid out in position — 5 Layout of fabrics finalised – including some paper birch bark (the yellow underside was more interesting than the white top).

With my final decisions made on the design layout and the fabrics to use, it was time to start adding some embellishing stitches.

Although not immediately obvious each work also has some golden elements (paper or foil) included with the dried peeled cherry & birch bark (from felled trees), twigs, or dried bark chips (these were a beach combing find!). All from my ‘that’s too good to throw away/it might come in useful’ stash!

Then it was back to the entire same auditioning process re the placement of Mother Nature’s treasures with the added complication of now having to balance these elements with those of the other two completed works, which in turn, might decide in which order the three collages should be displayed (1,2,3 or 1,3,2 or, 3,1,2 etc).

In terms of design, balance, or colour – if I saw a glaring ‘gap’, yet more embellishing stitches were added, particularly to subtly enhance the circles.

These collages are all about being nature inspired, so the following photographs show some close-up details which I have paired with various of my (oh so many!!!) images of Mother Nature’s spontaneous creations that surround us, even in the tiniest of corners.

close up details from my originally collage — 6 Detail 1 – A variety of stitches on the original collage

close up of stitched bark paired with a twig — 7 Detail 2 – Stitched cherry bark overlaid with a sheer with crocheted lichen and copper wrapped twig

close-up detail of second collage — 8 Detail 3 – Eco printed fabric, expanded wet-wipe and yarn tufts

Embroidery stitces to emulate moss and lichen — 9 Detail 4 – Embroidery stitches to evoke lichen and moss

Placement of fabric evokes the cracks seen in rocks and cut tree trunks — 10 Detail 5 – Reminiscent of cracks in rocks and aged cut tree trunks

detail of copper wrapped bark with a tufted yarn to resemble moss. — 11 Detail 6 – Copper wrapped bark, ‘cracks’ or maybe twigs and yarn moss

Framing the three collages….

I used my favourite method – by stitching each to card cut to fit the frame. I was so lucky that on one car boot sojourn, I found 3 IKEA frames, just perfect for my wall space. Each collage is 22 x 22cm (8½x 8½ins). At some point, I might present them in larger square frames with a wide 10cm (4in) mount (mat) to provide a counterfoil….before that….I’ll need to move house to have more wall space!!!

And herewith the final pieces, enough collage work for now I think….

The first collage — 12 The original work – I blame this one for setting me off down this path….I enjoyed it so much!

Collage two all framed and ready to hang — 13 Collage 2

The fianl collage all framed ready to hang — 14 Collage 3 – Giving birth to this baby was not quite so easy as it had to share it’s parents’ features!

But maybe something beckons….

Lichen and moss covered rocks on top of a stone wall — 15 Mother Nature’s circles – Mmmm food for thought perhaps!

Did I forget to mention that I also love the rocks and stones on which the lichen grow!!!

We’d love to hear about any dip or triptychs you’ve created.

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Category: Collage

Anyone for Kinusaiga – a crash course?

June 19, 2026 helenefeltzen Comments 22 comments

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Watercolors in Nuno Felt

February 22, 2026 ruthlane Comments 16 comments

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Altered Books – A Glimpse Inside

September 21, 2025 ruthlane Comments 6 comments

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More Altered Tree Book Pages

July 21, 2025 ruthlane Comments 11 comments

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Altered Tree Book Page Spreads

June 11, 2025 ruthlane Comments 18 comments

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Paper Layering Experiment

May 12, 2025 ruthlane Comments 14 comments

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Keeping out of mischief!

April 20, 2025 helenefeltzen Comments 14 comments

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Playing with Book Pages

April 12, 2025 ruthlane Comments 15 comments

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Grove of Trees – Part Two

January 22, 2025 ruthlane Comments 12 comments

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Inspired by nature – part 2

June 26, 2024 Antje Comments 22 comments

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