What if I ……?
Like a cat (and like most of us here) I have had many previous lives. At one stage I worked in finance, I was never really let loose on customers (possibly a good thing for all our sakes). When not fitting out apartments, I was strictly a numbers gal. This was before computers landed on all our desks. When they did, I found them mouth wateringly fascinating (I guess you are beginning to understand why I was best kept in the back office). The first software I had a chance to get my head around was called Symphony. It was one of the first spreadsheet packages the company bought into. I loved it. It had a great function called “What-If”. It’s still around today although Symphony is long gone.
You might now wonder why I am bringing this up. Well, I was bored recently. So I decided to play and to resurrect my own version of the ‘What-If’ function. In short, I had fun. Honestly I don’t do it enough.
So I just kept asking myself ‘what if’ questions, actioning them and seeing the results. I suppose this is the question we all quietly ask ourselves when we play….
Anyway, back to my playtime. What got me started was the question, what if I just doodle a resist? The only limitations I put on this was that I wanted an opening at the top and the bottom. Here is the result:
Next, it was decision time, the background colour…. What if I used black merino for this? Would it swallow up all my decorations? Would the whole experiment be a waste of time? So what if it was! Chickening out was not an option!
The last big question I wanted to ask was what if I laid all of the decorative elements against the resist and then laid my background? That’s not really rocket science, is it to felt blindly. But it does add to the loss of control over the piece but also provides an interesting element of surprise when the piece is turned the right side around after the resist is removed (and there’s no going back).
So here is the result of my what if experiment. I will take you through each element briefly to give you, I hope a clearer picture of the game. Each decorative element began with the question ‘What if’ so I won’t bore you with constantly repeating this. Let’s get started:
I laid a thick mix of linen and viscose on the widest opening of the vessel.
The reaction was quite interesting. The sheen of the viscose disappeared to a great extent so I suspect what I am looking at is more likely the linen element which was a dull red to start with. Both have adhered well and have produced a nice wavy pattern as they felted into the shrinking black fibre.
I laid down some art yarn that I had purchased from someone who was reducing their stash. This was in no way guaranteed to work as I don’t feel that person who sold it to me ever experimented with it. Here is what it looks like on the ball. I have absolutely no idea of its composition but I reckoned it was worth a try.
So I meandered it around two sides of the vessel. I actually love the result! It was caught by the black merino and is firmly embedded but not swallowed. A total win!
Next I laid down a thick layer of viscose in two different colours; first the red and then a beautiful shade of purple.
The purple was laid over and alongside the red. Because I was working in reverse, I expected that the red would dominate the line with the purple acting as an edging when the vessel was turned right side out. I was hoping that where the viscose laid on top of each other, they might decide to mix a bit. This result was surprising as the purple viscose was swallowed up by the black merino. The red adhered beautifully and kept its sheen so it looks quite different to the fibre mix used at the opening (mentioned earlier).
Next, I used a piece of lightweight silk chiffon that I dyed some years ago and had been foolishly keeping for a ‘special occasion’. I do have to ask myself why I find it so hard to cut into beautiful fabrics (I have too many of these!).
I expected the black to swallow up the silk completely but this didn’t happen (confession: I did give it a light shave to see what would happen). Very pleased with the result here.
On a rummage, I found some prefelt I made ions ago, it was time to throw this into the mix.
I had made this red prefelt using viscose as a decorative element so I roughed up the back, cut it into strips and laid it down on the resist. I was able to play with these lines when I was fulling it and create a 3 dimensional surface on the vessel. It was fun twisting and turning these as I worked them. The black fibre migrated through and they now remind me of coils for some reason.
Turning over to the other side, I played with the notion of a felted ‘shibori’ element. I found some prefelt and made the 3D elements stuffing the prefelt and tying it off. I then roughed up the back. I laid some black merino on top of the prefelt (avoiding the balls) so that the ‘shibori’ would protrude from the vessel background. These were then laid face down on the resist. I did not have the same control when felting as I could not get my hands near the bases of the ‘shibori’ That said, it produced interesting results.
My next experiment was to nuno felt some fabric into the vessel but to leave a hole where there was no merino used.
I was inspired by something I learned on a course with Jorie Johnson but I used a different process to Jorie’s here. I decided to double up on the fabric to make the hole a little more interesting I used a purple silk behind a very delicate lace which came from an old mantilla someone donated many years ago. Before laying down the fabric I outlined the future hole with pencil roving, then popped the fabric on top. The purple silk extended way beyond the featured hole and it felted in wonderfully. I love the overall effect.
Then I used some very special locks. The donor was a Leicester Longwool sheep aptly named ‘Bright Eyes’. These were sourced from my buddy Leonor who is the creative genius behind Eleanor Shadow (https://eleanorshadow.com/) Be sure to check out her website and all her beautiful hand dyed products. Here are some of the locks I used. The colours are gorgeous!
I thought I would add a little of Bright Eyes to the mix to see how it would react to being totally felted into the vessel. The fibre kept its lustre and happily felted in without being swallowed. I do have to add that I would prefer to see these beautiful locks move freely as a statement on a piece rather than being ‘imprisoned’ in this way. Just glad I only used a few!
Finally, my last experiment involved taking some of the hand dyed silk I had used earlier, I gathered it by hand stitching, I laid it down on the resist so that the hand stitching was uppermost and then added the black merino background. I had no real control as to how this would felt in so I needed to do a bit of pulling to loosen up the fabric once I turned it as the black fibre had come right through all the layers. All a learning experience. Next time I will work with the stitched fabric on top of the fibre as I will be more in control and have less tugging and pulling (and cussing) at the end.
All in all, the play was fun. No methodical approach to sampling here, just good fun. And sure don’t we learn when we are having fun! Here is the final piece:
Next: the update on workshops taken. Just one this time, flowers with Diana Nagorna. I supersized one of two of the flowers (just for fun of course) Here are the results.
Lastly, registration is open for my online course wet felting a spiral. The course will start on 30th October and run through the month of November. You will have access to step by step videos, a downloadable PDF and, of course yours truly here in the virtual classroom. Please feel free to click on the following link to find out more https://feltingandfiberstudio.com/classes/hanging-felted-spiral/ It will be the last spiral session for 2026 and as I plan to do a bit of travelling next year I am not sure of my scheduling for 2027.
Happy felting (and playing) all!
Helene x
