After the last less than successful attempt at making a small spiral, I thought I would try some prefelt. Here is the link to the last attempt. Small spiral fail
I have 2 kinds of prefelt. One is thin and almost transparent. The other is thick, and you can peel it into two layers if you want to.
I cut 3 circles from both types of prefelt. I also cut holes in the centres and a slit. You can really see the difference in thickness in this picture of the circles stacked together.
The green is very thin, so I just overlapped the ends of each circle and gave it a few jabs with my felting needle to hold it in place
The white is quite thick, so I split the ends, then cut one side off. I then overlapped the ends and needled them a little so they would stay in place.
I wet them and inserted the resists between the layers.
Then I tubbed them both for 5 min on each side.
5 min on each side seemed to be enough. They were stuck together and feeling more solid. They had shrunk a tiny bit.
I gently rolled them in my hands so they would full. I kept checking them. I didn’t want to turn them into felt balls or snakes.
They both had good shrinkage. I was worried about the hole in the centre getting too big, but they stayed about the same ratio to the outside circle.
They both turned out quite well.
I let them dry flat, and they hang about the same dry as wet. If I weighted them, they would stretch longer, but I like them like this.
My plan had been to add them to a beaded stick keychain like the ones with the sheep.
When I tried to add them to a beeded stick, they wanted to stick in between the beads, making it hard to get a nice spiral. I may try them without the beads, but I am wondering if I got some of just the keychain end part; they might just hang free with maybe a curly lock on the end.
Last time you saw the bag I was making, as a sample for this class. The class was at https://www.forestcovefarm.ca/. It was lovely. It was outside, and it was quite hot, but not as hot as the next week. There were a couple of pop-up tents and lots of trees for shade. There is also their store that is air-conditioned, so we could cool down if needed.
Most of the pictures are quite blurry. I am having trouble with my camera not focusing. Near the end of the day, I did find out that if I zoomed out to .9 it would focus, so the final shots are better. I have been to the Apple store, and they are ordering me a new camera.
It was a great group, with a wide range in ages from late teens to retired.
Adding the colour to the ropes took longer than expected, but I was glad I made the cores for them.
Corinne sent me a few pictures of the day, so here I am teaching.
Here are the blurry shots of everyone’s bags before felting.
I seem to have missed one. There should be 8.
Last night Corinne from Forest Cove sent me a few pictures. She had a shot of the bag I missed.
After much rubbing and rolling and them all thinking nothing was happening, I had them check the bags against the resists, and they were very surprised at how much they had shrunk. This gave some more energy, and they were able to finish the fulling. I only managed 3 pictures of the finished bag. Everyone was in a hurry to pop into the store and get cool and do some shopping.
The grey and purple one was much better in person. And I suspect that the purple will show much more when it is dry. I am hoping some people will send me pictures of thier dry and finished bags. They had to add the handles after they were dry. I did get one, but my email seems to have eaten it. I sent them home with instructions on blocking them and drying them and some tips on blocking them more with a steam iron if they want to.
Everyone seemed happy, so I am happy. I think I will switch to a bag with a slit handle next time, as the rope handle took longer than expected. By my next blog post, I should have a new camera in my phone. Hopefully that means I will take better pictures.
I’ve been reviewing the future direction of my felt work. I’ve decided to stop having so many exhibitions and sales. I will still do some exhibitions but I’d like to focus less on what people might buy and more on the things I’d like to make, irrespective of whether or not they are saleable.
In particular, I’d like to do more complex 3D & sculptural work as I particularly enjoy it. So it was a happy coincidence that Gladys Paulus was offering an online felt sculpture course called SHAPESHIFT.
My very first blog on this site was about a 3D seed pods workshop I took with Gladys Paulus in November 2019. Herfe’s a link if you want to take a look.
I really admire her work and found her an excellent tutor so it was a bit of a no-brainer: I signed up for SHAPESHIFT with a glad heart.
You can find a full description of SHAPESHIFT through the link below. Essentially it is about developing your eye and aptitude for sculptural felting rather than producing a specific ‘thing’. Working from a 25cm flat circular resist, Gladys takes you through play, intuition and discovery, building confidence and a developing a sculptor’s eye.
The course materials are clear and thorough with extensive text and video descriptions. Gladys also gave generous, thoughtful, insightful and encouraging personal feedback, which was invaluable.
So, let me introduce my 10 sculptures.
The materials list suggested working with light coloured wool batts. The only light batts I have in a large quantity are Corriedale (25-29 mic) and Merino (23 mic) both from World of Wool. I started with the Corriedale, which is quite a bright white colour. All the sculptures start off with the same flat circular resist.
1) SEEDHEAD
This was my first sculpture. It’s quite a complicated shape and took me a long time but I was happy with the result. I could do with de-hairing it (I tried a heat gun but didn’t really get on with it).
2) CONTORTION
I lost sight of the overall shape of this one and had to go back and felt it some more. Isn’t felt a wonderful material that it lets you do that! It’s my least favourite shape but I learned a lot from it, which really is the point.
3) WRAP
I called this ‘wrap’ as it feels a bit like a hug. It’s less complicated than the previous two. Although it’s not obvious from these photos, it also tips slightly which gives it a slightly fragile feel.
4) SLIPSTREAM
With ‘Slipstream’ I was specifically working on getting smooth transitions between different planes: some nice sharp edges.
5) RINGS
I may go back and re-work ‘Rings’ to exaggerate the fact that the rings aren’t parallel. At the moment it feels a bit ‘meh’, although I do like the way you can see the light though the hole.
I thought my sculptures so far were tending to look like vessels. I’ve made a lot of vessels in my time so I decided to try to move away from those shapes. At this point I also switched from using the Corriedale to the Merino batt. It’s a more cream colour, felts slightly more quickly and gives a lovely smooth finish.
6) LEAVES
With ‘Leaves’ I worked on making more concave shapes. I particularly like that it looks completely different from the top (picture 2) than from the sides.
7) PLANES
More work on refining planes and angles
8) LEAF OR SHELL?
Similar to ‘Leaves’ in that I used some of the same shapes and didn’t want the sculpture to look like a vessel. I also like this one as it looks very different from different angles
9) UPTIGHT
I think with ‘Uptight’ I pushed the limit of how many different ribs and planes I could get across the shape. It was a bit of a tussle to get it as I wanted it, though I’m happy with the result. For a long time it was a horizontal sculpture but near the end it became upright, which contributed to its name.
10) TILT
I knew ‘Tilt’ would be my last sculpture for the course and tried to go with something a little more relaxed. I like that it seems to be balancing. I thought I might make a shape like three pebbles balancing on top of each other but decided they would be too small – I may make something like this using a long oval resist.
It was good to see other participants’ sculptures – they were all so different. For me it really illustrated the enormous flexibility of the medium, and how much the shaping is entirely in our hands
I absolutely loved this course. I learned some new techniques, which I will continue to use, but most of all I reveled in taking time, letting things develop slowly, experimenting and learning as I went along. I have a bit of a felting gap now due to other commitments but I am already thinking about what sculptures to make next.
I’ve always enjoyed wet felting, but this course really re-awakened my excitement in making felt. I woke up in the morning thinking about felting and couldn’t wait to create my next sculpture. That was joyful and a great gift. Gladys is working on a more advanced sculpting course called RESIST! Will I be signing up? What do you think?!
This last week, I have been preparing for a bag class I am teaching. This is a beginner class, so they will be making rope handles. The ropes will then go through holes in the bag and be tied with a knot. This is a nice style and fairly easy, so they can concentrate on the bag part.
Please excuse the pictures; I adjusted them as best I could. The light bounce from the fluorescent lights on the white wool and the plastic was terrible.
I don’t want to spend a lot of time on the ropes. To that end, I have been making snakes to act as the inside of thier ropes. I use a pretty standard layout, a row of wool singled across and then a line of wool at 90 degrees at the near side to roll around.
I roll it up dry and work it dry for a while to shrink it before adding water. If I go slow and gentle, I can get a nice, smooth snake. In this case, I am not being that careful because they will all get a final layer of coloured wool to match thier bags.
Adding a final layer of colour around the finished but wet ropes worked really well. The final layer was easy to wrap tightly around the core. I didn’t have to worry about “cracks” or “fissures” forming if I rolled a little too fast or not quite round enough. I think I will do that from now on, as it gave a nice, tight, smooth finish.
What I want to know is, does anyone know of a faster and or easier way to make ropes? They always take longer than you think they will, and if you’re doing more than a few, they are hard on your hands, or at least on my hands. I found ways to make small balls and large balls, but nothing on ropes. Any hints or ideas?
Before we went to camp, Debbie (right) invited us to her cabin on Lake Cumberland. When Susan (left), Dennis and I arrived there was a big sign on the cabin. This is an old joke having to do with plaques at camp where I signed my name really large (even on plaques I wasn’t supposed to be on).
Debbie who is not at all “arts and crafty” made this sign to make me laugh.
We went on Curt’s (Debbie’s husband) boat and had a great time on a gorgeous day.
Dennis (my husband) went fishing with Curt and John (Susan’s husband) and he was the only one who caught a fish. The stay at the cabin was very relaxing in preparation for the craziness of camp the following week.
We all got camp shirts when we arrived and here is the staff and volunteers for the first session of camp on Sunday afternoon.
On Monday morning, staff and volunteers are encouraged to wear muu muus. Here we are on Moo Moo Monday!
After breakfast on Monday, I helped Poecat (the arts and crafts director) and we eco printed some book covers for small books that the campers were creating. I was concerned the eco printing wouldn’t be successful but I was happy with the prints. The campers learned how to make a folded 8 page book (from an 8.5″ x 11″ piece of paper) and then used waxed linen thread and the pamphlet stitch to attach their covers to the books.
Monday night is crazy hat dinner so here we are in the dining hall with our hats. Look closely to see my hat 😉 At camp we have camp names, mine was Montana, and then we had Mac and Snooz. Mac and Snooz were teaching a unit of girls to play guitar which was called Treble in the Trees.
The next day was crazy sock day. Mac got us matching “friend” socks that hold hands. Ramblr is to the right of me. She stayed with us at the Air BNB cabin just outside of camp.
Then on to my four felting sessions, two on Tuesday and two on Wednesday. The first three groups were smaller but then the last group was 18-20 campers (10-11 years old).
I started them out with batts that I had made at home (packed into a large suitcase and brought on the plane) and then had them add the design on top.
I wanted them all to create different designs. The first group listened to music and created a piece inspired by the music. The next was inspired by “fauvist” landscapes as I had a bunch of crazy colors. The third group made portraits and the last group their favorite flower.
We had two hours for each session and the girls did a great job. Everyone ended up with a piece of felt that was holding together. Yay!
Here’s the Treble in the Trees group with their creations.
These are the CIT’s (counselors in training) with their landscapes.
This group was the theatre group who gave a show at the end about llamas.
And here is the final group that created their favorite flower. Didn’t they all do a great job?
For Wednesday night, it was crazy hair dinner. I made these wool dreads for us to wear and we sang a ukulele rendition of Three Little Birds. Unfortunately, we didn’t get a video of our performance 🙁
And don’t the men rock the dreads? Curt and Dennis at the Lake Cumberland cabin.
Snooz and Mac presenting the signed guitar to hang on the dining hall with the first session of Treble in the Trees. Here’s a link to their performance:
If you want to see more photos of what’s happening at camp, you can view them here. You’ll have to scroll down to the first week photos (June 7-12) to see our session.
Here is an award that we made for Kat, the camp cook. She works so hard to provide meals for all the campers, volunteers and staff. Billie was the cook for many years during the time I was a camper and staff member.
And to show that I was still paying attention to the beauty of nature, here’s a moth I photographed while we were setting up the music performance.
A good time was had by all but we were a bit worn out. Here’s our new shirts for this year. Hopefully, I will be able to go back next summer!
This post will be about a few different projects that I am into: as they are all small and easy projects, maybe you will get inspired to try out your own version of them as well.
I am participating to an Art Trail in my area, it is a big event in our neck of woods: it is my second time and I think that I have a better feel for what I need to prepare for it. That is, small usable felt things, that can be added to what I have left from last year, that I can easily bring to our venue by public transport (I do not have a car, I live in Greater London, UK and using public transport is a sensible choice to avoid traffic and steep charges) and that I can sell for a reasonable price. As it is not a Fine Art Only event, but more of a festival celebrating the creativity of all the people living in our Borough, any craft is encouraged and stalls can also sport a mixture of fine art and craft as mine will be.
Last year I sold a few of my wet felted earrings, so this year I spent a bit of time in making a few more but with needle felting: it was very quick, I enjoyed the needle felting practice, and I feel that I can keep to a low price for them.
Here are the pairs that I have made so far (the flowers on the top rows and the blue hearts) with the ones that I have left from last year:
They were really a breeze to make, while I was stewarding for my last group exhibition.
I also wanted to bring the blue loop scarf and the yellow lightweight scarf that were shown in previous posts, as loop scarves were admired last year (though I did not sell them very well, but who knows, maybe this year I will) and I will add to them this new lightweight scarf that I made with the recycled banana yarn used as yarn for decoration:
I loved the salmon colour and itched to use it.
It was pretty awkward to pair a very small amount of wool with the chunky yarn, it was really an experiment. I thought that maybe the yarn could give the wool a little bit more structure, but I am wary that the yarn will actually be a weak point of stress for the wool, and pull the wool apart quicker. Anyway, it was more work than I expected, as the wool was so thin that the yarn was not well felt in in places, so I had to needle felt the yarn in after drying it, and then cut all the hairy wool sticking out from the places that I had needle felted. I will maybe not do it in the same way another time: I could either go for a thicker wool layout or maybe sandwich the yarn in between two lightweight layers of wool.
I also am trying out an idea that I have seen from a British artist and crafter on Instagram, Maxine Smith @tillyteadance. She makes those lovely bookmarks in her very colourful style with a mix of wetfelting and machine stitching, with hand embroidered or needle felted details. You can have a glimpse at the process in her posts: she seems to make a full rectangle of wet felted and machine stitched background, then cuts all the bookmarks from that single rectangles with a rotary cutter, adds some details and finishes each bookmark by stitching all the edges.
I thought that I could try my hand at it, and see if it makes the bookmark making more time effective for commercial purposes. And, to be honest, it seemed like fun. My brother had this game when we were little: a lot of scenes on paper strips that you could combine to make an always different composition that told an always changing story. Here, I was picturing something like that, but made of felt.
Of course, I do not have a sewing machine, so my stitching was going to be very limited. I am also much less of a figurative artist than Maxine Smith is, and much less of a cheerful disposition. Here is what I made, with merino wool and a few scraps of a pale blue scarf (possibly silk, I do not know, it was a charity shop find):
Here are my background rectangles cut from the original sheet.
Then I had to make each one meaningful with some stitching (as less as possible) and have them tell a different story each. I also was keen on keeping them as abstract as possible, because I love that opening up of possible meanings.
Here are the stitched bookmarks as of now:
This is the most peaceful, maybe: just two little boats with shiny sails floating on a limitless sea..
This is the most disquieting of the four, but it just came out this way, and who knows, maybe someone out there would like a bird (pigeon? bird of prey?no idea) for their bookmark. My husband says that the bird shape is an alien life form under an alien sun: well, who knows, it could be.
This was meant to be an abstract landscape at night, so I stitched a moon in shiny DMC Diamant thread.
This is lonesome or purposeful and dreamy, depending on what you feel it represents.
I have to hand stitch all the edges now, but I need to go and buy some good thread in the right colour at my local shop. I would like it to be pale blue or something like that, and I do not have embroidery thread in that colour.
An issue that I have with them is that they are not stiff. The ones that Maxine Smith shows are properly stiff: I think that part of it is due to the extensive machine stitching, part to the fact that, on second watching, I noticed that she made thicker felt to begin with. I have no idea if she puts some stiff backing or if she uses a PVA glue bath to increase stiffness. Now, I am thinking about what I can do to increase my bookmark stiffness without spending too much time on them. My friends say that they are fine as thickness goes, and I believe a bulkier bookmark is not super easy to use inside a book, so I am not inclined to add felt to them on their back. I maybe will try with the PVA glue bath. Some of my friends also do not see why they should be stiffer, so there you go, I could leave them as they are, and simply display them on a paper backing with a couple of temporary stitches to keep them upright. What do you think?
I have made a couple more small abstract landscapes in unusual colours, similar to those that I have shown in my last post, and I have not added stitched details to them, yet:
This one has more sky and less ground, and I placed a round piece of silk rods up there on the right to make the sun.
This one is slightly more square and has more ground/sea/whatever than sky. Or I can always turn it upside down.
Which details would you think for them? I am very undecided.
Another thing that I am preparing is my contribution to the fundraiser for the charity Ealing Food Bank in this edition of the Art Trail. Last year, the artists from the Art Trail were encouraged to donate a small piece on the theme “Home” to be exhibited at a special venue and sold for a homeless charity: it went very well, so this year we are doing it again, for a different charity. The theme this year is “Food for Thought”, of course, but the requirements for entry are the same: it must be a square piece 20cm by 20 cm (about 7.8 inches), and they are going to give us the canvas, if needed.
They are going to provide us the canvas later on, but I have the advantage that I can complete my piece with no canvas at all, and then just stitch my work on the canvas when I will have it.
I started with the idea of a still life with fruits and vegetables on it: I do not know, I think about still lifes a lot these days (see my last post). I was not feeling like making it in wet felt, I do not know, it did not feel like the right thing, I wanted more of a sculptural piece and I went for needle felting.
Firstly, I prepared a wet felted background with some “wool for felting” that I had as a gift from a friend: I have no idea which kind of wool that is, so I seldom use it, but for this it seemed perfect, as it is very natural (I do not think that it is dyed) and in different gradation of natural whites and browns.
This is the background that I felted.
Then, I decided that I needed a real life reference, so I got out some peppers, an apple and a small bowl. I experimented with adding some green vegetables like cucumber or lettuce, but it was not working well, too big maybe. I wanted some green grapes to drape over the peppers and apple, but I had none in the fridge, so I just simulated it with a small vessel that has long curly locks hanging from it.
Yes, I know, it is nothing like green grapes. And sorry about the background chaos of cushions.
Well, then I started making the shapes in core wool, thinking that I was going to cover them with dyed Merino afterwards.
Let’s start from the pepper, as I like the pepper.
Going on with the shapes, I wanted to better visualise how they were going to fit with each other, so I placed them on the background and then loosely needle felted them one to the other.
White pepper on background.
Pepper and the apple.
Pepper, apple and hint of second pepper in the background.
Making grapes while thinking “What a brilliant idea, so fast to make!” or something like, if you get my irony and already know the nice words.
The grapes were a bit more time consuming, but when I saw the whole together I started thinking that I liked the whole as it was, white and almost ghostly. I feel that it is clear what the shapes are, even without colour, when seen in person. The photos get a bit confusing, to be honest.
I admit that it is unusual, as still life, a bit ghostly maybe, but that was the point of still lifes, to play with the concept of life and death by hinting at them. It is better in person than in photos, though, as the sculptural quality of the piece does not show well on camera.
So, in the end, I needle felted it all to the background and I will call it something like “I miss you”, because it made me think about a friend who recently passed away: she was a keen grower of vegetables in her allotment, and also still lifes are supposed to hint about life and death, and she passed away way too young, way too early, a typical theme for still lifes.
Another friend gave me the idea of felting coasters: it is maybe weird, but I am not one of the tons of people using coasters, so I had never really thought about making some, but it is actually quite fast and fun to make them, and it probably makes a lot of commercial sense (we will see if they sell well..).
Here are two sets of four coasters that I made recently:
I went for bright cheerful colours this time.
I will go on making a few more pieces for the Art Trail event, there is still time until September, and I hope to finish the ones that need a bit of working on, but this is it for now: I hope that you like what I have made so far.
I want to make some small spirals that will work on the stick-type keychain/bag charm things I have. I did them with some sheep I had last year.
I have a T-shirt that says; Hold on, Let Me Overthink This. And this is where I am starting with this project. I took Helen’s Spiral course last year, and it was amazing. If you have a chance, you should take it. I want to scale this down to end up about a 3-inch drop on the spiral. So I am starting by thinking this is going to be really hard to do, so naturally it is.
I started by making an underlay spiral to use as a template and resist.
The spiral was small, as I said, so I had to cut my fibre as it was far too long for one of the layers. Can you hear the spinners screaming NOOOO in the background? LOL Also, I was being supervised by Jan’s Llama
After much fiddling, it was sturdy enough to be removed from the resist. I worked on it more, but the layout was not good, and there were thin spots and narrow spots.
All in all, a sad looking spiral.
Next, I made some prefelt to try.
I tried to stretch and shape it around the resist. I already knew this was not going to work well. Wet felted prefelt does not have the stretch of commercial needle felted prefelt. But I kept going anyway.
This one is better, but although it’s hard to see, the middle of the spiral is very lumpy.
Here they are flat side by side. You can see the pumpy parts of the pink better here.
Oh well, it was fun trying. My friend Hether decided they were just what she needed for her bike.
This post is from guest author and our multi-talented felting friend, Sarah Ritchie, please check out her website to see all the incredible things she does (it’s not all felting!): https://www.sarah-ritchie.com/
Earlier this year, I had the privilege of being part of Deeply Felt (and the stories carried within) – a group exhibition by Auckland Felters, a Creative Fibre community of contemporary felters from across the Auckland region. The exhibition was held at Nathan Homestead Pukepuke in Manurewa, Auckland.
This exhibition was spearheaded by Teri Berry, whose vision and leadership brought the group together to present a cohesive and thoughtful body of work. Auckland Felters is a diverse group, and what makes this group so special is the breadth of practice within it. While we are united by wool fibre as a medium, the way each maker approaches it is entirely individual.
That diversity was evident throughout the exhibition. Works ranged from finely detailed fibre paintings and wall hangings, to sculptural forms and wearable works, each reflecting the interests, techniques, and creative voices of the felters involved. There was no single style or narrative, but rather a celebration of process, patience, and the tactile nature of fibre. It was also a privilege to bring fibre to the attention of the public as an artform – more than just a functional material or a craft.
As needle or wet felters and fibre artists, we all understand the time it takes to bring a piece into being. The process itself becomes embedded in the finished work. That sense of time and touch was present throughout the gallery, inviting visitors to slow down and engage with what had been deeply felt and carefully made.
This was the second exhibition held by Auckland Felters and it felt like a natural progression for the group. There was a sense of growing confidence – both individually and collectively – and an excitement in sharing felted works as art.
Held in Remembrance
Alongside the exhibition sat a special art installation titled Held in Remembrance.
The original idea came from Clare Hocking, who envisioned a collective work of handmade felted poppies to mark ANZAC Day. What began as a simple concept quickly grew into something much larger.
A call-out was made through our personal networks, social media channels and Facebook felting groups, inviting contributions from the wider felting community. The response was immediate and generous. 287 poppies were sent in by more than 50 felters from across Aotearoa New Zealand and around the world. Each poppy was handmade and unique, and many were accompanied by messages of personal connection with the men, women and animals who served.
What arrived was not just a collection of objects, but a gathering of individual acts of making. Different techniques, fibres, and interpretations came together, unified by a shared intention of remembrance, and a remarkable generosity of time, resources, and care.
I had the privilege of leading the installation, with the support of Clare Hocking, Teri Berry, and Jaq Spirrett. Jaq also created the felted barbed wire that formed a central element of the work, adding both visual structure and symbolic weight.
Constructing the installation was not without its challenges. Covering 3.6m wide and 2m tall, each poppy was attached to clear nylon thread and suspended between two battens. The felted barbed wire added a strong narrative to the artwork. Every poppy could be seen. Every maker’s contribution held its place within the whole.
The installation was created as a fundraising initiative for the RNZRSA (Royal New Zealand Returned and Services’ Association), supporting the health and wellbeing of New Zealand’s veterans of military service and their families. All qualifying donations will receive one of the poppies from the installation as a thank-you gift.
Apart from its fundraising purpose, what stands out most to me is the sense of international connection and camaraderie the project created. Felting can often be solitary, yet Held in Remembrance brought together a wide and generous community of makers – many of whom we have never met in person, yet are now connected across distance through a shared act of making.
The Open Day that wasn’t
We had originally planned to hold our exhibition Open Day on ANZAC Day itself, bringing together the Deeply Felt exhibition, Held in Remembrance fundraiser installation, a fibre market, and a workshop. However, we were advised (at short notice) that Auckland Council-run galleries would be closed that day, and the event could not go ahead (though, fortunately, the workshop ran as planned in an alternate location). This was immensely disappointing to everyone involved.
Clare and Beth demonstrating the art and magic of felt-making
And yet, in some ways, it felt fitting. ANZAC Day is, at its heart, a day of pause and reflection. While we had hoped to gather, the quiet absence of that event served as a reminder of the deeper purpose behind both the exhibition and the installation.
The finished poppy paintings – it’s hard to believe none of the participants had tried wet felting before!
What remains is the work itself – the hours of making, the shared effort, and the connections formed along the way. For Auckland Felters, Deeply Felt was more than an exhibition. It was a continuation of a collective journey, and a reflection of what can happen when individual makers come together with a shared intent.
After seeing Helene use some prefelt ribbon, I decided to give it a try too. I am thinking of differential shrinkage to get the shape of a shell. I thought it might work well with a spider conch shell to make the ridges.
I got my ribbon from the Olive Sparrow in Toronto. She doesn’t have it on her Etsy, but if you contact her, she has it. You can, of course, make prefelt and cut strips. But this is a fast and easy way to get going.
I made a 2-part resist so there would be an overlap on one side.
I made the inside pink, then added strips of the prefelt ribbon.
I added some blue for the outside. Sorry for the really bad picture.
Then of course the was lots of rubbing. I am using a rubbing tool from Moose Hill. It has a nice weight, not too heavy like others I have tried. I like to start gently. It does have a nice, wide handle, so it’s easy to hold and press down when that is what you want. Jan used my phone to take many of these pictures for me. She took about a dozen of this one, complaining that I was not smiling. Seems I do not smile when I am working.
Once it had shrunk a little, I cut out the resist and removed the non-spined side of the extra resist. If I left it, I think there would have been too much to curl inside for the middle of the shell. Then of course, fulling and shaping.
It wasn’t long into the fulling when I knew I had not used enough prefelt to get the differential shrinkage I wanted. I suppose I should have known better. But often that’s the way. You need to be reminded of what you already know.
Still, it didn’t turn out so bad
When I got home, I fulled the ridges in some and then clipped it all into shape to dry. As you can see, this made the base of the folded part pointy, and that remained after I took the clips off and let it spread out.
I wet just that part and fulled it back to round in a very short time. I had been anticipating a fight with it. I had tried to shrink this part more before clipping it with no success. This just reminded me of how, sometimes, it is easy to get more shrinkage after it has rested or dried and is rewet. I have no idea why that works, but it does.
After it was dry again, I was not happy with how the top with the points wanted to curl around instead of standing out, so I put a couple of invisible stitches at each end to hold it in position.
And finished. I like the finished shell, even if it didn’t go the way I planned.
I may give it another try over the summer, but as spring slowly arrives here( we had a little snow again the other day), I find I have lots of ideas and more energy to do things. I have things to make for the guild sale in the fall.
March 2026 has been busy with Guild library work, questionable weather (is it spring yet? It must be spring, I feel so ill (stupid snow mould allergy), no, it’s snowing again). There was a bit of needle felting. There was even my birthday, I had forgotten to have one last year with all the anaesthetic (but math caught up to me on this one, so I am older than I originally thought).
1.1) Arriving at the guild with my trusty vehicle, laden down with fibre, camera, and cookie.
This month, we had a chance to have a mid-week felting day in the local guild studio during the March school break. We had a few of the local felters (Wet and Dry) drop in for part or all of the day. We each had our own projects, and it was fun to do them together. We chatted and it was great to have others to discuss our projects with. Ann had a sculptural project using differential shrinkage, and I returned to the Mega-stegosaurus-bag, this time it would be a bit less mega (smaller) but remain Stega.
My goal was to figure out the correct size for the pattern and do a bit of sampling to make a final decision on colours.
Ann and I discussed more of the mechanics for the legs. When I put the bag down, I want it to stand on its own. Who wants a stegosaurus that falls over? Originally, I was going to put large wooden dowels in the legs and a base inside the bag. This would make the legs wool on the outside with a wooden centre. While chatting with Ann, we discussed removing the hollow legs and making the wood legs a feature, showing them.
I had planned a wooden base to hold the legs, but I can adjust this to the new plan. It will give a strong attachment site and keep the bottom of the bag flat.
2.1) Diagram of the side view of Mega-Stega leg design with four separate leg blocks
Since I want to have Mega-Stega stand when put down, he or she will need 4 legs screwed into the wooden base inside the bag. I may have to add 2 screws per leg to keep the legs from rotating or unscrewing. If I want to have fewer screws, I can use a block with a carved groove to represent the 2 front legs and another block to represent the 2 back legs.
2.2) Front view of Mega-Stega bag with separate legs vs 2 carved blocks representing 2 adjacent legs
2.3) Dropping legs and adding belly to the general shape of Stegosaurus
2.4) Ann suggested changing the angle of the neck and lengthening the tail.
Since I will need a way to get into the bag, I am considering the evil zipper. I am not fond of sewing zippers. I have done it before, but most of what I enjoy sewing are historical costumes, which don’t have them.
Because of the shape of Mega-Stega, having a head/neck end and a tail end, I have the option of making a pocket in each space or stuffing them to make them firm appendages. I also have the option of adding a partial armature so I can curl the head and or tail so it will hug the body rather than stick out in front of or behind. I will think about this more as I work through the rest of the design.
Ann reminded me that I should expand my pattern, but not as much as the last one. As you saw above, we removed the legs and added more belly to allow the belly to flatten to create the bottom of the bag.
3.1) Ann helped me create the floor underlay resist shape.
As you already know, a Stegosaurus has 2 rows of large plates running adjacent to the spine, and spikes at the end of its tail.
When I was in kindergarten, I got up very early (6 am) on Saturday mornings in the hopes that the TV would be showing the Palaeontology lectures from the University of the Air. (I was disappointed if the Math or English courses played.) One of the best classes had a gest Geologist discussing a new discovery: blood vessels in the plates of Stegosaurus. He suggested that this suggested that the plate might be a cooling system, which was unnecessary in cold-blooded creatures. By the time my parents woke up, I was finished with dinosaurs and was happily watching cartoons.
A year later, in grade 1, when the teacher said all dinosaurs are cold-blooded, I asked about Stegosaurus’ plates. She didn’t know what a stegosaurus was. Ah, yes, I see the problem! Adults don’t get up until after 7 am on Saturdays, so she must have missed the cool University lectures.
I will add plates, but I need to inset them slightly down the body, so I will have space to add the zipper.
3.2) Considering plate locations. Ann’s multi-part resist is on the other side of the table.
3.3) close up of plate location considerations
I want to give the suggestion of the flushing colours that a blood vessel system might have. I dug through my bag of red/orange. I have this braid of BFL/Silk, and I have a small amount of pure silk in a similar colourway.
4.1) Blue Faced Leicester (BFL) and silk 100 gr in shades from yellow through orange into red
I had considered a white base layer. Let’s make a sample.
4.2) Sampling over white wool
I found a bag of fibre that I thought was Corriedale. Whatever the fibre was, it seemed a bit spongy rather than firm as it felted. Hummm. That is not quite what I wanted in either the firmness or colour.
Let me try again. I have a half bump of black, it may be Merino. Why is it not labelled? I used the plate shapes I had cut out of the floor underlay as a template. I don’t need them to be hollow, so I don’t need to add a resist to the plate.
I lay out the shape in many thin layers of black, then added wisps of yellow, orange, and Red BFL/Silk. I then flipped the plate and put the top colours on the other side.
4.3) sample on black wool
Yes, that is more what I was thinking. Essence of blushing blood vessels! I made more samples in the various plate sizes I had cut out. I tried to leave the bottom part loose so I can attach it to the body eventually.
4.4) Samples of pates
I will have to make more, but this is a good beginning. I like the colours with the black under layer. I should be able to trim the tip on the one that is a bit messy.
4.5) samples and templates for the plate
I now have a colour scheme, a pattern which I think will work, and samples at least some of which I should be able to use. Now I just need a bit of free time and table space to try to create my Mega –Stega bag.
I will have to put this aside for a little while, as I finish the preparations for a new workshop I will be giving next week. I hope to show you more progress in the near future, have fun and keep felting.
1.1) Arriving at the guild with my trusty vehicle, laden down with fibre, camera, and cookie.
2.1) Diagram of the side view of Mega-Stega leg design with four separate leg blocks
2.2) Front view of Mega-Stega bag with separate legs vs 2 carved blocks representing 2 adjacent legs
2.3) Dropping legs and adding belly to the general shape of Stegosaurus
2.4) Ann suggested changing the angle of the neck and lengthening the tail.
3.1) Ann helped me create the floor underlay resist shape.
3.2) Considering plate locations. Ann’s multi-part resist is on the other side of the table.
3.3) close up of plate location considerations
4.1) Blue Faced Leicester (BFL) and silk 100 gr in shades from yellow through orange into red
4.2) Sampling over white wool
4.3) sample on black wool
4.4) Samples of pates
4.5) samples and templates for the plate