Felting and Fiber Studio

2025 OVWSG Sale

November 26, 2025 Jan Comments 15 comments

You have probably heard both myself and Ann, chat about the 2025 OVWSG Sale and Exhibition. We continue to have the Guild sale at the Glebe community centre, which started life as a church, changed congregations then became a community centre. It has had some renovations over the years, and this year, there is scaffolding surrounding part of the outside of the building. Other than the challenge of parking, it is a beautiful site.

As with every year, it was a busy time leading up to the sale. You may have noticed I posted for myself and covered for Ann to give her a bit of a break. Ann is not only baking for a local Farmers Market, a Fabulous felter and felting teacher, Guild Librarian, but also the coordinator for the sale, so she is very busy leading up to the sale and then really tired afterwards, but all her hard work was both worth it and appreciated.

You have seen lots of shopping opportunities lately, so this time I would like to show you a bit of the “behind the scenes”, some of the photos from the sale, then in the next post, finish by showing you the Exhibition.

Although Ann and the Guild sales team have been working since shortly after the last sale ended, the largest part of the volunteer teams get to work the week before the sale. On the Monday before the sale, we had gathered all the boxes and display grids in the studio ready to head to the sale on Friday. At 6 pm, we have the set up team at the Glebe, busy marking booth spaces and placing tables in booth spaces. The Team with Pickup trucks, loaded everything and met us at the sale around 6:30 pm.

1.1) The pile of stuff is ready to go, with the black grids just visible behind the folding tables.

1.2) Busy setting up the team, the room and dome is beautiful, but possibly had a leak

As soon as the tables were up, the vendors started bringing in their wares, with the help of the “assist-the-vendors-bring-stuff-in” team. The Guild Co-Op booth, Guild info booth, Make and Take table, the Exhibition and the demo teams were also setting up. We didn’t get to start as early on Friday as previous years (since the room was used as an after school daycare until 6 pm), so it was extra busy!

1.3) the various guild teams bringing in the guilds and vendor stuff (the blur of activity is Ann)

1.4) The booths popping up look like magic! (but it’s actually a lot of work)

I took a few (126) photos Friday night, to both document the guild activity and to create images we could post Friday night to entice shoppers on Saturday morning. (The postings seem to have worked, since Saturday morning was very busy with shoppers!) If you were curious, I took 873 photos in total over the weekend.

2.1) Molly Underhill’s Birch Trees

By this point, it had already been a busy week, and I was extremely tired. As I stood looking at Molly’s lovely trees, I wondered what needle she had used to attach the felt to the birch bark….. (Yes, I needed more sleep!)

2.2) Molly’s Canada goose bag and Glasses cases

2.3) Inge Dam’s Weaving

Besides felt, there were also booths of weaving, handspun yarn and commercially spun and hand died yarns.

The guild booth had the door prizes. When you filled out a questionnaire (it was short), you got a sticker and were entered for the door prize. For those of us whose phones are luddites and don’t recognise QR codes, they had a tablet to fill out the questions.

3.1) info table with survey and QR Code (QR removed since the draw is over!)

3.2) The Door prizes

3.3) Even if you don’t win a door prize, you still get to pick a sticker!

Once you have filled out the survey (this gives us info on where our shoppers are coming from, and a bit of what they were looking for) and picked your sticker, we can take a quick peek at the Guild Demo area.

4.1) Ann helping a new spinner in the demo area

4.2) Weaving and spinning Demos

4.3) Felting Demo (I am looking forward to seeing how this progresses)

The guild also had a “Make and Take” table, which had various small weaving, felting, and sometimes spinning projects to do and take home. This has been fun to see, with lots of younger new people, but also quite a few adults trying their hands too.

2 photos, Make and take table both show people around the table making small projects 3 photos, Make and take table 2 show people of various ages, around the table making small projects the last picure has the signeage from the end of the table explaining the table. 4.4-4.5) Make and take table, the team was busy most of the weekend!

Let’s look at the booth, time for some virtual shopping!!

5.1) The Vendors list and Map, in case you get lost, we will meet at the end near the exhibition

Booths:

Booth 1 is the Guild Co-Op booth, which gives members the opportunity to sell their work when they don’t have enough to have a whole booth.

5.2) These are blankets woven on the Guild’s 100-inch loom. The proceeds will help fund the guild.

5.3) A few of the items in the co-op booth

Booth 2 is Wendo Van Essen. She is a Needle Felter and has needle felted brooches, vegan taxidermy, needle felting kits, and pin cushions.

5.4) Booth 2, Wendo’s Booth

5.5) Booth 3, This is October Knits, a NEW vendor, with hand dyed yarn and fibre.

You may have spotted His colourful braided fibre at a few other events.

5.6) Booth 4, Judy Kavanagh and Don Haines

Spindles, heddles, shuttles, tapestry looms, fibre

5.7) Booth 5, Studio Three Fibre Arts and Unwoven

Booth 5 is a group of weavers, Studio Three Fibre Arts and Unwoven (Jean Down, Roberta Murrant and Deb Templeton), handwoven clothing, accessories, table linens, and fibre art.

5.8) Booth 6, Top of the Whorl

Spindles, spindle bowls, spindle totes and fibre in a variety of formats.

5.9) Booth 7, Wööl, emporium de laine

Hand dyed yarns, books, and notions.

6.1) Booth 8, Luna

Wood yarn bowls, crochet sets and art yarn.

3 photos, Hand spun and died yarn woven and knit, hand spun yarn. shot of part of the booth with people shopping 6.2) Booth 9, Fab Fibre Two (Jean Sharp and Bernadette Quade)

Handspun yarn, fibre, hand knitted and handwoven items

6.3) Booth 10, Handweaving by Janet Whittam

Handwoven garments and accessories, baskets, household linens, rugs

6.4) Booth 11, Strapped for Cash

Handwoven straps and bands, including guitar straps, bag straps, hat bands, key fobs, lanyards, and bracelets.

6.5) Booth 12, WindWeft (NEW this year)

Mohair locks and yarns in natural and hand-dyed colours, mohair/wool blends, handspun and mill-spun yarns, rovings, batts, and handmade wool dolls.

6.6) Booth 13, Inge Dam’s Handwoven Textiles

Handwoven scarves and shawls

6.7) Booth 14, Wayside Weeds and Wool (Amanda Carrigan) Handspun yarn, natural-dyed yarn, handknits, kits and patterns

6.8) Booth 15, Farmer Brown’s

Felted and wool based children’s play materials. Adventure Playmats, Woodland Gnomes and Fairy Houses.

6.9) Booth 16, Weave Me Be

Woven landscape tapestries.

7.1) Booth 17 & 20, Mapi Creations

Hand dyed fibre, Natural Fibre, Felted DIY kit, Felted Fabric, Art Yarn, Interactive Art Batt station

7.2) Booth 18, Maple Weaves

Handwoven wall tapestries and finished handwoven scarves

7.3) Booth 19, Felt by Molly

Felted goods

7.4) Booth 21, Carmen Deschênes, Lise Susin-Horth, Elisabeth Davy

Roving, locks, felted objects, handwovens

7.5) Booth 22, Makeloo Studio

Yarn certified 100% Canadian wool and hand dyed, also certified fibres

Oh my, that was a lot of show in not that big a hall! Maybe we should wander up to Bank Street and pop into a restaurant for lunch? We can meet back here afterwards and look at the Exhibition. If you are not parked in the city lot a block away, don’t forget to move your car when you drop off your purchases; it’s 3-hour street parking in most of the Glebe!

PS Sorry!!! i must not have saved properly, some of the photos were missing they loaded but did not attach, i must not have pushed save correctly!!! i hope this works now!!

A lot of yarn, but not really

November 24, 2025 Shepherdessann Comments 14 comments

I like to spindle spin. I am slow at it, and it is just a fun, relaxing thing to do at a social or demonstration. I don’t knit or crochet. I have what seems to me to be a lot of small balls of 2-ply handspun. I know it’s not a lot really, I don’t suppose there is enough for even one sweater. I do use some in my felting. I never used a lot of it, but since I don’t really sell anymore, I use even less. I thought about trying some pictures using yarn. I could needlefelt it down a bit and then wet felt it. I have several large freezer bags of yarn. I thought it would be best to see what I have and sort it by colour.

I had 4 bags and some part bags of yarn.

There should be more. I went searching. I think they must still be packed. I did find my bin of short-length mini skiens that I used to sell. More about them later.

I sorted them into colour groups: greens, red/pinks, blue/purple, yellow/orange, grey/brown and mixed. I had no idea I had so much pink.

I need to rewind some of the balls. Not sure what happened to them.

These are the miniskiens. They are 12.5 yards(11.4m) in each mini skien. That’s enough to do a pretty dense design on an 8-foot (2.4 m)by 1-foot (30cm) silk scarf blank. Enough to add a couple of accent rows to a knit hat or use for a bit of colour in punch needle or rug hooking. I can’t find a picture of them nicely displayed in a basket for sale. I bet Jan has one, but I don’t want to bug her to find it. This is what they looked like when I dumped them out of their box with all the tags on them.

I took all the tags off. The are all sorts; thick and thin, and some that are both. I will add the gag of them to my class supplies. I plan to make some more small skeins from the newer handspun to add to it, so there is more colour choice. I know I saw my 1-yard niddy noddy recently.

and all safely back into ziplock bags

All in all, not a lot of yarn. I have a commercial yarn stash too, it is a real mix of fibres and styles, and a whole other story. I don’t know if I will try a picture completely out of yarn, but maybe I will make more of an effort to use some of it in pictures and other felt.

And lastly, I have to thank Jan for doing some blog posts for me lately. I have been run off my feet baking to get ready for our 2 Farmes Market Christmas sales. The last one was Saturday. There is a small one that my daughter will go to with my husband. I will be teaching. Anyway, here is a picture just before opening on the 15th. No snow this year.

Oh ye, the comment button is at the top of the post.

Painting Fabric

November 22, 2025 ruthlane Comments 10 comments

Our local group meeting in November was all about painting fabric. We are still working on background fabrics that will be included in our fabric books. We used a variety of “fabric” paints that are heat set.

Louise had cut up a bunch of different types of fabric to paint on and had a wide arrary of paints.

Sheer blue green and blue painted fabric

White fabric with blue green and blue paint.

Blue, blue green and russet painted fabric.

The idea was to spray water on to the fabric, then add paint and then you could if you wanted, add another piece of fabric on top to pick up extra paint. The photos above show a piece of sheer fabric that was painted, then a piece of cotton velveteen was added on top. The final photo on the right shows the velveteen after all the paint colors were added. This is Sally’s fabric.

Fabric with brown paint that has been scrunched on a paper plate

Painted fabric with brown and black mottled background and white circles.

Printed and painted fabric with brown paint in palette with brush.

Paula was working in shades of brown. These fabrics are all still wet, so it will be interesting to see what they look like dry.

Orange, yellow and brown painted fabric with printed trilobyte fossil

I was working in fall colors. When you see the black printing, those are fabrics that we screen printed years ago that Louise still had in her stash.

These are a few of Louise’s painted pieces.

And one more photo of one of Sally’s painted fabrics. We left the fabric at Louise’s house to dry and then everything will need to be ironed. Next month, we have plans to do some fabric weaving for a book page.

An oval table is covered in small amounts of bright Merino wool in different colors

A few smaller projects

November 20, 2025 kikistextileart Comments 12 comments

Hello all!

I have been trying out a few smaller projects instead of bigger ones lately, also because I have a few work-in-progress things that I would like ideally and probably in another shiny life to bring to conclusion, so you could say that I am saving myself for them and very predictably not getting much done with them anyway, always hoping for the magic time and place, you know, for THE BIG PROJECT..so much so that I may have forgotten what they were all about in the first place, very likely!

Anyway, some of my little projects may be of inspiration for the approaching seasonal marathon..you know, I am referring to Christmas and the various little crafty things that we are always involved in when it comes to this dreaded and waited for period!

I have been experimenting with wetfelting locks onto Merino and with differential shrinkage in a few small pieces, four small decorative vessels and one pouch that I have not finished with a zip yet (because sewing, you know, I hate sewing):

Three small felted vessels in dark blue and bright locks are on a round wooden table with a card in front of each of them. A black laptop is in the background — Three of my small experiments with the same theme of dark blue Merino and bright locks going on. BFL tangerine locks for the left one, Teeswater locks for the other two.

A small bright pink felted vase with ridges close to the bottom and white rose fiber close to the lip, on a blue patterned cushion, with a wooden background — In this one I tried to have ridges close to the bottom by adding layers of wool: you can see them but they were a bit of a disappointment as wow factor, and I liked the vertical or slanted ridges that I managed on the other three vessels a lot better.

A small felted pouch with a blue background and bright pink decorative locks all over it on a wooden surface — This is the small pouch that I need to finish with a zip: I think I will maybe give it to my daughter who was briefly obsessed with my small vessel with the pink locks, so this pouch should be a success with her if I ever get around to finish it.

I was in kind of a low mood and I decided that I wanted to do something quick and bright, just to decorate my house and not worrying about it being ‘perfect’: I made myself a colourful wreath, not to celebrate any particular occasion but just because. Anyway, it can be used to welcome any sort of event, I am totally in favour of using it again and again giving it different meanings each time!

I mentioned that I did not want to bother overmuch about making it, so I basically put some Merino wool in different colours on bubblewrap all over the table, roughly flower shaped and roughly leaf shaped clumps in no particular order, in four greens and four bright flower colours.

Wetting and rubbing and rolling all together was done very quickly, and then I spent some time kneading and throwing and rubbing individual ‘flowers’ or ‘leaves’ or small groups of them. I then cut and shaped the flower petals a little if needed, but mostly kept them as they were.

An oval table with a white towel and bubble wrap on it, and clumps of colorful wool covered by wet netting — Sprinkling with water all together.

Clumps of flat soaped and rubbed wool in different colors on an oval table covered in a white towel and bubble wrap — The soaping and rubbing step done: all clumps of wool are fairly squashed into formless shapes, but luckily I was not looking for accurate.

In the foreground a wooden rolling pin tool by World of Wool is on a few clumps of soaped wool on a table covered in a white towel and bubble wrap. — I got to use this carved rolling pin tool from World of Wool that I rarely use: this time it was the perfect one for the job of getting a bit more rolling in.

A mass of soaped pieces of prefelt in different bright colors is on a white bubble wrap covered surface, and a rolling pin tool mby World of Wool is in the left corner — I also got to kneading and doing some more energetic manipulation, clumping all the wool together to do it quicker. Actually that is a part that I really enjoy, I find it very therapeutic.

A red plastic tube with a bubble wrap full of darker shapes rolled onto it and fixed with elastic bands is on an oval table covered in a white towel — Some proper rolling of all the pieces together, also to cut on rolling time.

A lot of irregular pieces of bright colored felt are on a table covered in bubble wrap and a white towel, and there is also a wooden rolling pin tool by World of Wool — All nice and rinsed: as you can see, the final shapes were very irregular and not particularly flowerlike.

A clump of felted wool in different bright colors and irregular shapes on a bubble wrap over a white towel — They still look very colourful all clumped together when dry, though.

After washing and drying the lot, I prepared the supporting circular wreath using spare wire from cut flowers that I shaped into a circle. I wrapped a type of plaster tape that I had from the years when my daughter was doing Irish dancing (you know, dancers wrap it around their toes to avoid blisters, you buy it in pharmacy), so that the wool would take hold and also to keep the wire together (it was not a single piece, but pieces in the plural).

Then, I wrapped some core wool around it and needle felted it in place all around the wire, careful not to break needles on the wire. When I was happy with the shape and consistency, I covered the core wool with dark green Merino wool and neddle felted it in place.

An irregular circle of wire taped with a white plaster tape. The small blue box of plaster tape is at the center of the wire and both are on jeans clad legs. — That is how I prepared the wire for my wreath

An irregular circular shape in white core wool is resting on a needle felting blue pad and there is a needle stuck on the pad. — It is very clear where the core wool has been needle felted and where it is still only loosely wrapped around the wire and needs working on.

A circular shape of white core wool is held by a hand onto a green felting pad — The shape is more or less ready for being covered by the next layer

A hand is holding a forest green top of Merino wool to add to the white circular shape that is on the green felting pad. — Adding the forest green Merino and covering the core wool

A forest green ring in needle felted Merino wool is held on a green felting pad — Here is the finished ring.

At last, I was ready for the fun bit of needle felting all the flowers and leaves onto the wreath, alternating colours and making it look as full as possible. That last was tricky, because I maybe needed a bit more flowers and leaves, but I also strategically cut a few of the flowers to obtain smaller ones to fill in the wreath a bit better.

On a green felting pad there are some irregular triangles of violet felt put together to form flower shapes and small spare triangles, small scissors and a felting needle — I cut some of the felt to make it seem more like flower shaped and with the resulting bits I made some new smaller flowers by needle felting the irregular triangles together by their pointy ends.

A hand is holding a felting needle to a pink piece of felt and is poking it to attach it to a forest green circular shape, on a light green felting pad. — I needle felted all the flowers and leaves to the wreath, starting by the big flowers , then the leaves, and adding the smaller flowers and leaves to fill the gaps in the composition.

A loop with a spare ribbon and here it is:

A hand on the left is holding up a felted wreath in many bright colors, in front of a white wall. — Here I had not put the ribbon on it, yet, but there you go, it is done and you can see how it looks like.

I am thinking about making a Christmassy one and an Autumn-colours one with the same devil-may-care approach to accuracy, as it worked quite well for me and it is very relaxing not to actually care about details. Just to have some variety through seasons I may go pon with them, but I am keeping this one permanently on at the moment, regardless of seasons, just because.

Since I have finished the slow stitching blue spiral bowl, I had to find something else for my hands to make while stewarding at our last exhibition with my art group, so I started on this little friend, that will be eventually donated to a kid, either one of mines or someone else’s I haven’t decided:

A hand is holding an unfinished little felted monster with a blue body and red mouth and orange eye stalks and crest. The background is dark grey. — I am not very advanced, but I felted the two eye stalks and its crest on its head. It is complaining that it can not eat anyone yet as he has no teeth, apart from the fact that with no nose and no actual eyes on its eye stalks it would be hard to find preys..

Needle felted in Merino wool, because of the bright colours.

Being aware that creativity needs creativity to spark and flourish (and it was also Leonor’s suggestion to keep your creative juices running, if I am not mistaken), I have also tried my hand a bit at other small projects in different mediums: that is what I have painted yesterday, with an eye to having a few interesting and original Christmas cards ready for when my daughter will come asking me for cards for each of her teacher on the day before the beginning of Christmas holidays (totally not something that we experienced last year, eh, on the evening before, after dinner and everything, when I was thinking only of my bed…):

On a red plastic sheet there are a bigger and a smaller paper sheets covered in small painted squares. The tiny squares are abstracts in different colors — Maybe I can cut them out and make cards with them? I used acrylics, pigment ink pens and oil pastels for the left one, and the same but watercolour instead of oil pastels for the right one. You probably can not tell by this photo, but there are tiny details in ink pen in each square.

I am not sure that all are that good, but there is something satisfying in having a bunch of tiny paintings done in the time that one (at least, me) will take to just think about a bigger painting, and now I can pick and choose if I want.

In the meantime, my felt slippers that I had bought about 1 year ago were just getting full of holes, my toes poking out through them, to the point that I was considering throwing them away: it just seemed such a shame, as the sole is still almost new and they are very comfy and they were a bit on the expensive side when I bought them.

Here is a ‘before’ pic:

A pair of red and grey felt slippers with big holes at their points on a wooden floor — Well worn out, with big gaping holes at the toes

So what I did in half an hour on a slow afternoon was just getting me some wool and needle felting it in place over the holes, attaching it to the ragged edges of the gaps, trying to include into it all the bits of old felted cover that I could still use.

I used a piece of packaging foam as felting pad to use right inside the slipper:

A hand in the foreground is pushing a chunky bit of foam into a red slipper. There is a light brown carpet and wooden flooring in the background — A chunky piece of packing foam can be handy if you stall the husband enough that he does not throw it away immediately

A loosely needle felted roughly round piece of red and grey wool is held in one hand close to the hole in a red and grey slipper — I prepared some loosely prefelted bits to felt into the existing felt of the slippers, by mixing red Merino wool top with some grey carded wool of unknown origin that I got gifted.

A red and grey felted slipper with a mostly grey addition of prefelt to the upper, nicely rounded — It is clear that I just did not plan the colours in advance, just trying different things on one slipper and on the other, if mixing colours on the prefelt to add or felting in first one colour and then adding the next.

One hand is holding a red and grey slipper while another hand is poking it with a felting needle. In the background a grey sofa with felting supplies on it. — It was mostly quite easy to needle felt them, apart when poking close to the sole, when I was afraid I would break a needle, but luckily it did not happen.

The effect was quite good for such a quick fix, even though I had not bothered about actually getting to the same exact colour of the original felted bits: my husband was pretty amazed at the result, that I could repair my slippers so perfectly.

Here are the finished repairs:

A person with white socks and pink trousers who is mostly out of frame is wearing red slippers. in the background a wooden floor and a light brown carpet. — Well, they are uneven and all, but I l felt that I could go on with my life. (I used my daughter to model this ‘after’ pic, as she was eager to try the as-new slippers)

Unfortunately, as you can guess, my quick fix did not stand the test of everyday wear and tear for more than a month or so, so at the moment I am almost at square one. BUT not exactly, as I now know that I can easily fix them, and I have understood that I should have wetfelted them after needle felting the bits in place: it just was not actually felted firmly enough, because I did not have the patience to work on it properly, so my needle felting was only a basic prefelt, almost, and obviously not enough to make it sturdy. So, when I will have to do it again (quite soon), I will be slightly more patient and actually wet felt them, and hopefully my felt will still bond to the original felted bits. One of the reasons that I had decided not to go on wet felting them the first time was that I was unsure if the new bits were going to fall apart and just not bond with the unknown wool of the original bits: I will just to have to try and see.

I suppose one option could be completely redoing the upper bit with a new one, so the issue of bonding unknown wool with mine would not come up, but the sole is tough rubber and I am not sure if I am able to sew it on, plus you know how I hate sewing.

How would you suggest tackling the issue of repairing those slippers?

And on this repair dilemma, I wish you all a good felting time and see you in the next post!

Kiki

@kiki.textile.art

http://www.kikistextileart.com

Am I losing my marbles?

November 18, 2025 teriberry Comments 13 comments

Do you feel like the days, weeks and months just keep getting away from you? No matter how hard you work, paddling faster and faster, the to-do list never gets any shorter? It has been 6 weeks since Felters Convergence, I was hoping for a quiet spell before the Christmas rush but it feels like it has been another insanely busy period. When I stop and think, “What have I done / achieved?” I’m at a loss…. I can’t remember!

Thank heavens for the camera roll in our mobile phones!

Early October saw my first ever pit firing with the Manurewa Potters, it was a lot of fun, with a shared lunch but, for me, the results were a little disappointing. I love colour and contrast and this style of firing produces more muted, subtle tones. It’s probably not a branch of pottery for me but I’m glad I got to try it.

These were my pots, the red / orange rings around the top were from underglazes I painted on before firing, the browns, greys and blacks were from the materials added to the fire. I have started waxing the one on the right, which has intensified some of the colours and it’s growing on me but the one on the left I think will be re-fired with some more traditional glazes.

In mid October I hosted my first Open Studio event in New Zealand, as part of the Franklin Arts Trail (which gets unflatteringly abbreviated to FAT). It was a huge success, I met so many fascinating people, introduced some of them to felt-making and even sold a few of my finished pieces, so now I have space to make more!

This photo was taken during the reorganising / scurryfunging, I’m sorry to say I forgot to take any photos during the event. Can you spot the ever-helpful cat (Aoife)?

A few felty friends and I had a play date just before Halloween where we made felted eyeballs using a variety of different techniques (felting around glass marbles, polystyrene balls and making solid wool balls).

Halloween weekend was spent with the lovely Waikato Creative Fibre group at a wonderful 3-day fibre retreat. I even managed to get some spinning done in between teaching a couple of short felting classes and taking a mosaic crochet class.

Fingers crossed I now have enough yarn to finish making a sleeveless top with a tulip hem:

Auckland is starting to feel much more summery and the weeds in my veg patch agree, they were definitely winning…

But after 6 days of hard graft and 1 broken garden fork later I was delighted to find half a dozen leeks, some potatoes and a couple of onions ready to harvest and I no longer cringe at the state of this part of the garden:

I contacted Spear and Jackson about the fork because it had a “10 year warranty” sticker not really holding out much hope that they would replace it but amazingly the replacement has just arrived, all the way from the UK, less than 2 weeks after I emailed them! Now that’s good service 🙂

A few months ago Auckland Felters applied to hold a group exhibition at Nathan Homestead, an historic building that has just completed a year-long renovation, and we were successful – YAY!

The exhibition doesn’t open until next March but deadline for the marketing materials was last week so there has been a lot of frantic activity as we formulated a plan for a felting workshop and market day. The date of our workshop falls on 25th April, ANZAC day (the antipodean equivalent of Remembrance day) so we thought a field of felted poppies would be a fitting project.

With only a few hours before the deadline I found myself hastily felting a sample for the brochure. The result is ok but not my best work. If I can find a spare 30 min I would like to fix the central flower with some needle-felting and add some more highlights and shading.

My local craft / gift shop, Clevedon Creatives + Co, have started stocking some of my work so there has been quite of lot of trips back and forth to get it set up. Now my studio looks even more empty than it did after FAT but I am pleased to have a wider audience for my work.

The Christmas season has already started here with my first artisan craft fair last weekend. This market, at the Franklin Arts Centre in Pukekohe, was a very successful start to the season, fingers crossed this is a good omen for the next few weeks after 2025 started with a bit of an economic whimper.

The felted soaps are eternally popular at my local craft markets so I have been furiously making these most evenings for the last few weeks:

There has been quite a lot of dyeing going on too, mostly silk hankies and silk top as I try to keep up with demand. These plaits will be added to my Etsy shop over the next few days.

Finally a bit of felting fun, a new journal cover. When I started laying out the wool for this I was planning to cover it with yarn in a grid pattern but just as I was about to start laying out the yarns it screamed, “WATER!”. So I rummaged in my bag of prefelt scraps and found some space-dyed orange and yellow pieces. Perfect for fish! A couple of white silk hankies to emulate splashing water / surf et voila!

I’m so glad I ditched the yarn, the jumping, playful fish are much more fun! I can’t help but smile when I see them 🙂

Phew! No wonder the last few weeks have felt busy 🙂 Why couldn’t I remember any of that without my phone…?

Finally Mer-Felting! in Toronto Ontario Canada part 2

November 16, 2025 Jan Comments 9 comments

October 22^nd 2025

As we prepare to head out of Oakville, we were sad to leave. We have so many happy memories, of visiting Glenn’s parents, the years we were walking our giant black barking “cat” through the neighborhood, even a couple times past the hotel we were just in. That was a long time ago. We stopped at his parents Church and visited the memorial garden. It still had flowers even this late in the fall.

7.1) Oakville Memorial garden

Now its time to get on the QEW (Queen Elizabeth Way), the highway that turns into the Gardner Express way….. don’t let the name fool you it was not expressing speed….

As we trudged along in heavy traffic… it’s now well after 10am, the young Mer seems happy smiling out the window and looking at whatever is attracting his attention. Eventually the road turns north and becomes the Don Valley Parkway, still not moving fast but the scenery is now trees with tall building looking down into the valley. We even spotted a subway car crossing under a bridge. It all must be very exciting to a young mer on his first big trip. I had made cryptic notes, and checked with google maps before heading out, so we found the building without difficulty. It looks like an old industrial building that had many loading bays and production area for about 2/3rds of the building and the last part was a 2 story office area. It made me think of an old newspaper or print shop.

Finding The Olive Sparrow

Monika is upstairs, there is a small elevator so we can yet again avoid those evil stairs. Why don’t you join us and see what I found.

Holding the door open you can look past and see some of her felting supplys 8.1 Monika welcomes us to the Olive Sparrow

If you have seen Monika’s booth at various fiber festivals you will remember walls of bags of colour in various fibers, tools, fine theads, needles and other distractions. I was looking for something to help a friends project and I was curious to see what else she may have that she hadn’t shown us at the various sales.

8.2-8.9)the Olive Sparrow, an overwhelming amount of fibers and colours!! I noticed more things in the photos than I saw while there!!

9.1) Glenn found a comfy enough chair to read and nap as we chatted.

I explained what I was looking for today and we found a few options, including some viscose in excellent colours. I had not found more maori short fiber batts locally, so was extremely pleased to see she had all the brown tones I had used to make moose for the moose bags. I found it compacted to a dense even felt.

Monika showed me a piece she was working on. there are lots of ways to transfer and image to felt or fabric ground, but once you start working you can obscure the guide lines. we are both of an age that remember overhead projectors used at school. She had found some of the transparency sheets and had transferred her line drawing to it. so she could use it to check her layout. This is brilliant, it is easier then trying to redraw an outline as you are working or using proportional dividers.

10.1-10.2) line drawing, picture felting on antique linen and reference photo, and using a transparency overlay on the image to check proportions and progress.

I wonder if I could add registration marks, or use pins, magnets, or bulldog clips to keep the transparency from shifting? I have not seen the acetate sheets for overhead projectors, since I was a teen ager, that was a while ago. (I will be doing a search on line!)

Monika also shared a method of blending and storage of the blended fiber she was using. Instead of just hand blending (stacking and separating until the desired colour is achieved. Which works well for small amounts but can be harder to reproduce the same colour each blending, for larger quantities.)

11.1) hand blending

Instead she lay out the colours in thin wisps similar to how you would lay out fiber for wet felting. Then lay wisps of the other colours on top. Alternating thin layers of wisps.

11.2-11.5) blending larger quonties similar to wet felt layout but stacked in thin layers

She then took the line and from one end rolled it up keeping the fibers in the same direction.

11.6) rolling up the fiber keeping the locks parrelell

She then worked from the stack she had just made and repeated the laying out of thin layers as she had just done.

11.7-11.8-11.9) she continued to layer the wisps then rolling until the amount of blending she wanted had been reached

Once she had the colour she had wanted she took a sheet of paper placing the fiber on it, then folded the paper over the fiber. this kept the fiber parallel. she then rolled the paper with fiber inside and labeled it for latter use. If I have been storing blended fiber for later use I tend to lay it into a zip lock bag which I usually label. Storing it in a folded then rolled paper will keep the parallel alignment which is more helpful when making topcoat for a peice.

12.1-12.3) keeping the blended fibers organized and ready to use

I was very impressed with the collection of needles Monika had available. She had be able to get one of the ones I was very curious about, the “teardrop” shaped felting needle. this odd needle has all its barbs on one side. What would a one-barbed-sideded-needle be used for in Industry? It is used then a woven ground fabric, has fiber added to it. the theory is that the teardrop shape will pass through the woven ground fabric without braking the warp or weft threads and embed the fiber to be attached.

I spotted this in the industrial info a few years ago and immediately was curious, would this work for hand needle felting too? But did not think I would get my hands on a sample. Monika had one and liked it, I am looking forward to investigating this odd needle further.

13.1) some of the needles in sets, she also has a broad selection of individual needles available too.

14.1)The young Mer seems happy with my shopping and is being helpful holding my map notes on our way back to the car. (the Mer-Boyfriend is enjoying his improved hands!)

I found viscose in various colours, a mill end and more Maori short staple batts . She also sent me home with small samples of two core wools she was selling. I think the Young Mer enjoyed the shopping trip and visit with Monika! Now its time to head back to the car and start the return to Ottawa. Once we are back there is more to do to get ready for the Guild sale and exhibition.

I hope you have enjoyed the trip to Toronto and got as distracted by the reflected light and shadows on architecture as i did. i hope i can have another shopping trip to Monika’s store (i know she will mail things but its so nice to be able to feel the fiber and have a visit with her!) I promise I will tell you more about the tear drop needles when life gives me a moment to have fun and investigate.

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Finally Mer-Felting! in Toronto Ontario Canada part 1

November 14, 2025 Jan Comments 7 comments

Finally Mer-Felting!

Monday, Oct 20^th 2025.

Monday Morning arrived much too early. Instead of my original plan of donning my apron, a cherished reminder of my wonderful mother in law, and heading to the guild to work on the library, Glenn was loading a couple of suitcases and a project box into the car. It’s going to be over the usual 5.5 hour drive, with a brief stop to feed the car and ourselves. We are adding a couple quick shopping detours once we get into the Toronto area (primarily, Board Game Bliss). So maybe it will be quicker if you meet me in Oakville? The hotel has a pool you could wait in, but its hours are limited, and it was really chilly the last time I was in it. (No wet felting in the pool while you wait!!!)

1.11) A map of the edge of Ontario, between Ottawa and Oakville, to give you perspective of where we are going today

It was a long drive down, is it possible that either Ottawa or Toronto have moved farther apart? By the time we got into Oakville, and found a spot to eat dinner, the Pool was closed. So, how about we meet on the Go Train platform just down the street from the hotel, and you can come into Toronto with me, it’s the 8:30 express train. Don’t forget your umbrella, the forecast is rain all day.

Tuesday, October 21st 2025

One of Glenn’s Brothers ( brother #4 of 5 brothers) is joining us today, having flown in from the States. I am sure you will like him, he is a math teacher and thespian. We hiked down from the hotel to the Go station. Oh my! The Go train has a raised platform for wheelchairs and walkers to more easily get on and off the train. The Train worked beautifully and was very comfortable. Unfortunately, when we got to the subway station, the lifts for the subway were not all working, so it took a bit of extra time to find the lifts that were and get back from the detour the helpful transit people had sent us on. Good thing the building we are looking for is not too far from a subway stop. We arrived just in time, instead of early, as Glenn’s brother thought we would be. (Avoiding stairs always takes much longer when using public transit.)

We were going to a posh law office in a very high tower, in a canyon of high towers, reflective glass and old stone buildings.

1.12) Some of the landmarks I could see

There were comfortable couches and snacks by the reception desk, and an open stairway in front of a tall window. This window alcove had 2 chairs and a few plants, and a fantastic view looking, I think, sort of south or southeast. (It was hard to tell on the 16^th floor, all my normal landmarks are at ground level, and I never had a direct view of the sun. Later consultation with the map suggests I was looking west-ish.) The Brothers wandered off to a room on another floor to do legal stuff. (I am not a beneficiary, I am not one of the 5 brothers, so I didn’t go with them. I am just here as Glenn’s Driver, moral support, and to do some felting.) I gave up the too-low comfortable couch for the area under the stairs in front of the window with my box of felting supplies. I checked with the office manager that I would be out of the way there, and the huge window could prove interesting if the rain holds off longer.

1.2) This is a nice office, I don’t want to be underfoot, and the lighting is better over by the window.

1.3) Settling into a corner under the stairs.

1.4) There were some iconic buildings in my view. The Hudsons Bay building, a church(out of shot to the left) and what I finally figured out was old Toronto city hall and New City Hall.

I spotted an odd building that may not have been a building. I have seen a program on a subway system, I think it was Boston, but it could have been New York (both were discussed in the program), they had buildings that kept their facades, but had been gutted to add ventilation systems for the subway tunnels beneath them. I think this may be one of those fake buildings. It looked very interesting. I would love to have had a tour of it!

old brick building with turbines in center of it. 1.5) a shell of a building? 4 massive turbines stick out of the middle of what remains of the stone building.

As I was getting organised to start felting, I noticed I had more than just architecture to watch this morning. I have seen roofers working before, but it’s always from below (not a very enlightening perspective). This was a flat roof, too, so not something I have seen done in person before. This will also give you an idea of the actual zoom on my camera, as I got curious about that, too.

no Zoom

pulling back a bit to see more of the work happeing

Some Zoom

zoomed in to watch the workers aply the rubbery membrain

More Zoom

1.6-1.8) Oh no, now I have made all the guild members very nervous!!!

While they are getting to work, adding plastic sheeting and rubber membranes to the sides, I should get to work too. As much as the Mer-boyfriend wants to do his own abs, I should really give him a hand (ok, literally). I am going to focus on hand and arm musculature today.

I started with forearms and strengthening the wrists. The density of the felt was too soft, and the wire strength was overpowering the wool felt through the full forearm. I want the arias just above and below the wrist to be much firmer so the wire will be persuaded that bending at the wrist is correct, while bending in the forearm is not. If you are making a figure that will only be in one position, this is not as big a consideration. Since I don’t know how they will eventually decide to pose, I want them to have options.

2.1) Diagram of wool density around a joint

Note: if you would like the surface over the joint to have the same superficial density as the surrounding felt, you can use a crown needle or use shallow felting to firm the surface, but leave the under layers less densely felted.

2.2) working on the muscles of the forearms (the extensor group)

2.3) working on the posterior aspect of the upper arm just above the elbow joint

It’s handy to have good myology (Muscles) and osteology (Bones) diagrams for this. If you don’t have an extensive selection of anatomy and myology books, Google can be very helpful with its search “Images” tab. Good research is part of the fun of felting!

Once I had firmed up the arms, I focused on his hands. I have the fingers wrapped and have added the beginnings of the thenar and hypothenar eminence at the base of the palm. The fingers can be tricky or fussy to work on. If you only work from one angle, it will flatten the look of the fingers, so working all the way around the fingers works best. Make sure that your needle has the first barb close to the tip so you don’t have to stab deeply to move the fibre. This is again a good spot to switch to a crown needle; it’s not as fast with only a total of 3 barbs, but it doesn’t need to go as deep to engage the fibres.

2.4-2.5) working around the thumb

the Young Mer takes a brake on top of his project box 2.6) Mer resting and having a break in his project box (needle in lat border of the palm).

I checked in on how the roof repair was going. I was trying to figure out if the gravel part was done or if it was yet to be done.

3.1-3.2) watching roofers lay out plastic on top of the black layer, and wondering if the area with rock is finished or yet to be worked on. Using the zoom, I figured out that the gravel is the top layer.

The reflections are interesting with the stormy sky and landscape reflecting in the glass tower in front of me. The clouds have varying looks of impending downpour pour but so far, no rain has fallen. In the glass tower in front of me, I can see a landscape reflecting what is past the building I am in. As the light shifts and changes, the reflections shift too. It is distracting from my felting, and now I wish I were working on a landscape (don’t tell the young Mer, I will get back to working on him again!)

3.3) Storm clouds and reflections in the glass tower before me.

If you look to the lower right side of the reflected building, you will see the landscape that captivated my attention. I am not sure if it was just the shifting lighting or if it was the segmentation of the image by the window frames. I spotted a brief sliver of light on the fall trees as it passed and disappeared.

3.4) The landscape reflected in the glass with a sunbeam piercing the clouds, highlighting a stretch of trees and houses.

The clouds cleared for a moment, a bit later, but were quickly followed by a thick grey miasma of impending wetness….

3.5-3.6) It was particularly striking with the blue sky reflecting in the glass and the storm rushing in behind the building.

3.7) The storm rushed past, determined to dump water somewhere else since the sky cleared and the reflections of clouds were fabulous

I next turned my attention to the old City hall (the new one is a half-circle tower, not nearly as interesting a building). The old tower and main building are dwarfed by the much taller buildings around it. Unlike the many new reflective towers, this building has ornamentation and detail to look at. I hope you are fascinated by architecture as I am and will be inspired. If not by the architecture, then maybe it will give you thoughts of who would live in a building with such interesting windows and what they should wear? What would the gargoyles look like if they got up and flew off? Or, maybe the patterning around the clock face tower will inspire a vessel or scarf?

4.1- old city hall disappearing into the new building surrounding it

4.2- just peeking over the building, the fabulous fenestration and detailing are just visible,

4.3- Gargoyles!! Oh, the dentils in the roof and repeated under the gargoyle’s ledge! What is that pattern just under the clock? If only I could get closer…

4.5- Oh yes, I can get closer!

4.6)- more patterning on this gable end, the sun with swords, circles with a bar and plain weave?

4.7-In the late afternoon, the sun came out, giving this raking light, creating depth and accentuating the details

4.81- As the sun swung further around and pierced between buildings, it finally struck the glass neighbour of old city hall. Bathing the old building in reflected light and shadow patterns from its towering neighbour.

4.82) Sunset is approaching, and the reflections off the glass tower onto the stone and copper roof are intriguing but almost lost amongst the urban landscape.

5.1)The young Mer showing the progress on his hands

5.2) Hands can be a suggestion, or you can spend a long time adding knuckles and surface detail (ask Google to show you surface anatomy, and you should find diagrams of the superficial features)

By late afternoon, I had been switching back and forth, from felting to photography, as the light shifted and played off the reflective surfaces. That landscape I had been watching in the reflection of the building across from me occasionally had highlights of sunshine between clouds, causing parts of the landscape to be illuminated while other parts were darkened. It was very dramatic.

6.1) Another sunbeam strikes the landscape reflection in the building across from me

The sun was getting lower, and I was hoping for a fabulous sunset.

6.2) The reflections and cast light were getting interesting!

Glenn was sent down by their lawyer (for brothers #2 through 5), to say I could go upstairs and join brothers 4 & 5, since a possible agreement had been found… but when I got there, ah, not quite yet. Glenn had carried my Camera, which accidentally stayed in the room with him, and I went to the hall by the elevators. There was a small table beside the door labelled mail-room and a perfectly placed pot light. So I unloaded my project box and got back to work. Unfortunately, I missed the sunset, since there were no windows in the hall. I did have a lovely chat with a lawyer (not involved with mediation) who was working late as well. I give her a quick demo-brake, explaining needle felting and the Missing Mer-teen dilemma and making a Mer-boyfriend to tempt her out of hiding.

The process ran into the evening, but I had an audiobook and was happily felting. Eventually, they were done. No one ever saw brother #1, but he must have been there somewhere. Brothers #4 & 5 and I all headed back towards the subway, the Go-train, and eventually back to Oakville. (Drat, it’s too late and the pool is closed again). (The floating would have been nice, but I am really not fond of the wetness of the water. Water would be much better if it was warmer and drier.)

Wednesday, October 22nd 2025

Very early in the morning, we said goodbye to Brother#4, as he headed off to the airport to fly back to the States. It was very good to see him. Hopefully, we will be able to visit the 3 brothers living in the States in the future, but not until the law applies equally, women regain their rights, and sanity returns.

We also packed up and contacted Monika, of the Olive Sparrow, to check if it would be ok to drop in on the way home. She is not too far off the Don Valley Parkway, south of the 401 highway. She would meet us in about 2.5 hours, lots of time to get to the other side of Toronto!!! ………..

We loaded the car with suitcases, the project box, and the Mer-Boyfriend looking out the back seat window and waving at passing cars (I did take the needle out of his fingers so it was easier for him to wave, if he wants to) (to be continued shortly)

Remember, the sneaky comment button is still hiding at the top of the page as I am writing this, if you would like to comment or just say hi!

Multi colored clamp dyed cotton velveteen drying over chair back

Clamp Dyeing Fabric

November 12, 2025 ruthlane Comments 13 comments

I am happy to report that our floor is finished and we finally have all of our furniture back. I am still unpacking and rearranging but we are definitely near the end of this mammoth project. I’m happy with the new floor and perhaps at some point, I will completely forget the experience of having it done.

My local art group had another get together in the midst of the floor redo and we did some clamp dyeing. I didn’t take any process photos but I do have some of the finished pieces.

We had five pots of acid dye on the stove including bright yellow, yellow ochre, brick red, dark turquoise and purple. You can fold your fabric however you want or not, and then you clamp different objects to the fabric to create a resist for the dye. You put the clamped fabric into the lightest dye pot first. Then you can unclamp, reclamp in a different pattern and put it into a different color. You work from lighter colors to darker colors. You can dip the fabric partially or put it into soak. The variation are endless.

Purple and yellow clamp dyed wool fabric

Closer view of clamp dyed wool created with metal screen.

Three pieces of clampl dyed wool and one piece of silk.

We used a variety of fabric too. The wool we were using was a very thick, hairy wool blanket. It really had to be clamped tightly and the results weren’t as crisp as thinner fabric.

Red and yellow clamp dyed cotton velveteen

Green, turquoise and yellow clamp dyed cotton velveteen.

These pieces are cotton velveteen which actually worked really well with the acid dyes. You can see that the thinner fabric took the dye differently.

This piece was done with two metal bird shapes that are the same. They were clamped to the folded fabric on either side.

This is a piece of Kraftex that was folded and clamped, then dipped into various colors.

This is a piece of silk that was folded up tightly and clamped and then dipped into various colors of dye.

Here’s a few more pieces of wool blanket.

And Birdie was supervising the drying process on the porch!

We’re planning on using these fabric pieces to create fabric books. We will be working all year on creating the fabric, then the different pages with other techniques and then putting the books together.

felted tea cosy in the shape of a pumpkin

Autumn Leaves Display, Pumpkin Tea Cosy and Stars for Christmas

November 10, 2025 rosiepink Comments 12 comments

Lyn

I’d originally planned to make an autumn leaf garland, so I made a large piece of felt patterned only on one side as all the leaves would face the same way. It comprised three fine layers of green merino wool fibres topped with one layer of autumn colour merino wool fibres and ‘bits’ of fabric and nepps. Dry layout with close up shown below.

I made a cardboard leaf template to enable me to cut out 30 leaves.

The leaves were stabilised all around the cut edges with watered down PVA, 50/50. When they were dry I stitched a wire stem to each leaf held in place with thread.

When Annie and I saw the pile of leaves looking as if they had just fallen off a tree, we both thought they would make a lovely seasonal display for a cold fireplace or a large sideboard. Annie had the perfect colour and shape jug (it was in use in Annie’s house with a display of dahlias but they were nearly finished so reluctantly they got discarded before their time) then Annie went twig hunting in her garden. After much snipping and choosing and changing our minds, we ended up with this.

Then came the fiddly job of attaching the leaves … without disturbing the arrangement of the twigs and the leaves already in place … not easy … my swear jar is almost full.

Annie

Making a tea cosy has been on my project list for a long time. In my imagination it has been many themes over time as the seasons and celebrations come and go and none of them have come to be, but suddenly the time was right and my tea cosy has been born as a pumpkin!

It was reasonably quick to make and was a bit of experimental fun. I am surprised it turned out as well as it did!

I made a couple of samples that helped me test some fabrics (which if I’m honest were going to be a garland but I ran out of steam and moved on to the tea cosy!). The samples were small at 11cm wide and 18cm wide, see below.

I decided the tea cosy had way more chance of getting finished if I kept it really simple. So I just made two separate sides and stitched them together, adding in a stalky handle at the top, rather than a more complicated and time consuming seamless 3D form.

I was also going to embellish it with a “carved” face but decided against it to give it more year round appeal.

I started with the handle as that seemed most fun as I had not tried a curly cord before. The cord needed a flat end to be stitched into the seam. It was not very technical. I got a small piece of green prefelt then wrapped loose green fibres around it then added a tapered amount on the top that I would make into a cord and then let it dry twisted around a paintbrush. It worked surprisingly well. I made it far too big forgetting that the felt of the pumpkins would shrink, but I just cut the end off to make it shorter.

I had planned to make some prefelt to lay on to the flat sides to enhance the creases and shaping but then I changed my mind and just reshaped the fibres I had laid out into two pumpkin shapes. I used a paper template and reversed it for one side so that I could keep the pumpkin sides roughly the same size and shape during felting. To give a little extra firmness I added a thin rope of fibres around the outline.

I added fabric scraps and knobbly yarns to give an abstract pumpkin look to the skin. There were so many interesting pumpkins in all shapes, sizes, colours and textures at our local garden centre so I made my own variety taking inspiration from several different ones.

I decided to stitch it together right sides out to keep some of the uneven edge, rather than sewing and turning. And no it’s not lined, life is too short for that!

Lyn

To make a star garland I made a large piece of multi-coloured, merino wool felt. It was liberally topped with silk fibres in green, red, gold and pink but disappointingly they mostly sank into the wool fibres during felting instead of shining brightly on the top! Dry layout photos below.

When the felt was dry, 11 star shapes were cut out – 1 large, 4 medium and 6 small – then the edges were stabilised with pva/water mix (50/50).

Simple hand stitching was added using a very fine, sparkly gold Madeira thread. The thread is very thin so 4 strands were used at a time – yes – it was often a tangle nightmare!

Small star brads were easy to push into the felt.

Here is a close-up of 3 stars – the large star is 17.5cm (7”) wide.

The garland was strung with Madeira metallic effect yarn. It’s very strong but lightweight and has no stretch.

The star garland has a ‘wing span’ of 180cm (6 feet) so I was unable to pull the camera far enough away to get it all in and the detail would have been lost – so I spread it out on my craft table and photographed it in two halves!

There are 11 stars – the centre star is in both photos.

Right half

Left half

Felting Glasses Cases

November 8, 2025 Lindsay Wilkinson Artwork Comments 20 comments

Although a recent eye test showed I didn’t need a new prescription, I decided to buy some new glasses anyway to give me more colour/style choices and also hopefully reduce the time I spend trying to find my glasses. I have a place at home where they’re supposed to live but I often thoughtlessly plonk them down somewhere and then get cross with myself as I play hunt the glasses.

On seeing my new glasses’ accompanying dull acrylic felt cases, I decided to make some wet felted wool cases of my own, either for myself, or to sell or give as gifts.

I want the cases to fit snugly, so that the glasses don’t slip out but also don’t need any kind of closure fastening: a simple wet felted sleeve. I like the simplicity of this idea and also the challenge of working them to exactly the right size.

While on holiday recently, I bought a carded (mostly) Wensleydale wool batt from a farmers’ market in Ithaca, New York, that I thought might be suitable and I was looking forward to trying it out.

Here’s some of the batt, the work of Windsong Farm in Burdett NY www.windsongfarm.com

I like a sturdy glasses case as it has to withstand being bashed about in my capacious handbag, so I decided on 4 layers of wool: two natural white merino tops and two of the Wensleydale batt – which includes quite a lot of locks.

I calculated a generous size for the case and multiplied the finished dimensions by 1.7 to give me a nice firm felt.

And here it is dry: side 1, side 2 and end-on to show how thick the felt is.

I was happy with the result, though because of the thickness and shrinkage it took quite a long time to felt it fully.

My second case I decided to treat more like a seascape picture. First, I rounded the corners on one end of the resist to give the case a more rounded bottom. I laid out two layers of wool: pewter for the top half that would become the sea and white for the lower half, that would become the beach.

I laid two layers of blues with white angora highlights over the pewter section to form the sea, and two more white layers topped with a strip of very sheer recycled spotted silk scarf which I hoped would look like pebbles for the beach.

I then ran a line of kid mohair top along the length of the case where the sea meets the beach to form a wave. I find this type of mohair felts with a nice wiggle that suggests a breaking wave.

Joining the silk so as not to leave a gap or have a bulky overlap was a bit fiddly but I find it works most easily with a very sheer silk. It’s interesting how dominant the wave looks in the photo because of the curvature of the sides.

Once that was done, it occurred to me that perhaps people view their glasses cases more in portrait mode than landscape? I decided case 3 would be less ‘landscape’! I also started to think more about how people use glasses cases. I’m sure some, like me, have them rattling around in a large bag. But I suppose some people want to put them in a pocket, so may want something a little thinner?

As I was rummaging in one of the giant boxes of charity shop silk scarves I’ve collected for nuno felting, I found a very sheer small orange scarf with wonky purple circles that I thought I’d try for case number 3. I laid out 4 very fine layers of orange merino tops (to reduce the overall thickness).

My plan was for the orange of the silk to merge with the orange of the wool so that the circles were more prominent than their background. I added three pieces silk to each side of the case.

4 thin layers, of merino, 3 wonky silk circles per side laid out then prefelted ready to full

I’m still felting these very firmly. You can see the shrinkage when comparing the finished case to its resist. I’m not completely sure why, but I’m getting more shrinkage in the width than the length. Probably it’s because it’s easier to roll it in that direction, using my hands and various thicknesses of pool noodle inside the case during fulling. Whatever the reason, it’s nice and firm so I can afford to chop a bit off the length of the resist.

Left – finished & dry; top right – testing the fit; bottom right – showing the shrinkage

For case 4 I decide to go thinner still (I’m thinking of someone putting their glasses in a jacket breast pocket) so switch to 2 layers of wool – this time a natural marled grey merino – which I think looks quite pebble-like. I added a little white wool to the surface to enhance the pebble look.

I forgot to take progress shots but here is the finished case.

It is definitely thinner and a little softer, though it’s still felted very firmly.

Now I’m starting to think about the time these cases are taking to felt. I have a week in a gallery in December and will also be offering some things for sale in two other galleries that that have a local handmade artesan ‘market’ throughout December. I could sell some cases as they might make nice gifts, but I’m not sure how much people will be willing to pay for a glasses case.

Cases are generally supplied free when you buy glasses and I know most people have no idea how long something like this takes to make. There’s not a whole lot I can do but I thought that making two at once may reduce the making time a little.

So, cases 5 and 6 will be twins. I cut a new double-length resist and laid out some natural marled grey Corriedale wool.

I like the white veining on the merino ‘pebble’ case but it’s fairly subtle so I add more of it to these ones.

Top: double-size resist with wool laid out and wetted tightly round the resist. Middle: case 5 (rounded bottom). Bottom: case 6 (rounded both ends)

I keep twin one (case 5) the same as the previous cases, with a rounded bottom and flat top, and cut a rounded top of twin two (case 6) to make it overall more symmetrical. Actually, I really like the symmetry of this rounded one, but realise that the top is a bit more flimsy than previous cases: presumably because I’m overlapping more wool at the ends of the resist than in the middle, where I have cut these two apart.

Because I prefer the single to the twin cases, I decide to make the next pair alongside each other but separate.

I have some lightly prefelted ‘pebbles’ that I made earlier, so set these out on the bottom halves of two resists (on two layers of merino wool) with 4 layers of blue & green merino wool and strands of white angora on the top half to create the idea of sea.

Left – layout; right – prefelted

I soon abandoned working on both at the same time as the pebbles were a bit tricky to felt round so many corners so I worked on the two separately

Comparing the finished one with the wetted out one, you can see that I lost quite a bit of the pebble definition but I’m still fairly happy with them and they are very sturdy. Indeed, when dry and lightly shaved you can see more of the pebbles, in particular the nuno elements.

I have some Corriedale wool that I dyed ages ago (to make this bag)….

….so for the next pair I go for a blue, green, purple colour fade.

This time I use just 2 layers of wool and they are (not surprisingly) considerably thinner and slightly smaller than the previous pair. They are also much quicker to produce as the layout is fairly simple.

Finished: cases 7 & 8 colour-fade hand-dyed Corriedale

For number 9 I try lightly prefelting 2 mussel shells (one for each side) which I felt into a sandy-coloured background.

Left & middle – layouts side 1 & 2. Right – nearly finished case

I only made this yesterday and it’s still a bit damp. The finished image isn’t a great photo as I’ve taken it in domestic electric light but it gives you the overall impression.

And finally, another recycled scarf but this one is white dots on a red background from a fairly open-weave wool fabric.

To get round the fiddliness of joining / overlapping fabric on this size and shape of resist, I cut out two sections of the scarf and laid one on each side, with gaps along all the sides.

Here’s the layout and here’s a photo of the finished glasses case. I only made this today so it’s very wet. I’m hoping the dots will be a little clearer when it’s dry.

So, what have I learned from all this? Well, I’ve enjoyed playing with all the different layouts. I drew up a list of ideas and I haven’t even completed half of them so there’s plenty more to play at when I have time.

I think my favourite more complex ones are the combined pebbles & sea. For the more simple layouts I like both the grey & white pebbles and the blue / green / purple hand-dyed Corriedale ones. To sell the glasses cases I will have to focus on the simple ones as the more complex layouts take way too much time to make. I’ve already made a couple more of the grey & white pebble ones and will probably make a few more simple brightly coloured ones before I move onto other things. I’m not sure yet which ones I will keep or give as gifts. Do you have a favourite? Or any you don’t like?

Felting and Fiber Studio

An International Collective of Felt and Fiber Artists

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