felt vessels – Felting and Fiber Studio

Various Vessels

March 2, 2018 zedster66 Comments 7 comments

I mentioned in the blog post before last that we’ve started working with resists at the well being centre. After our first piece using strips to cut make channels and cut flaps, we moved onto 3D. Our next piece was using just a flat resist to make a simple case, either with or without a flap. I chose to do mine without a flap, because I wanted to finish it off at home and shape it differently over a bottle. I shaped it over a Lucozade bottle so it would fit perfectly:

The week after we moved onto bowls using a flat, round resist. After we’d done our final layer we added some carded Bluefaced Leicester and a few locks. Somehow our balloons for shaping had vanished so we took them home to finish off. I really liked the shape of mine, it was really texturey. It still had a bit of a ridge around the middle, but I decided to just leave it because a previous vessel I’d liked the bumpy shape of lost it went I worked on it a bit more and put absorbent cloths in. The vessel is still wet in these photos. This is the bottom:

One side:

The other side:

BFL Texture:

One of the weeks, there was just a couple of us and none of the new members so we made slightly more ‘advanced’ vessels. I used a resist that I usually use for birdpods, but shaped it for a vessel:

The top had an interesting shape where I’d cut it open, I thought about neatening it, but liked the curves:

I fulled it a lot and got some nice migration from the yellow inside. It looks a completely different shape from this angle too:

I rarely take photos at the well being classes, the room has a strange orangey light, and I generally just forget! We had another new member so we’re making soft wispy pieces again, and opposite me, our previous new member is making a more advanced vessel with very little instruction. I hope she brings it in next week, it was a great cylindrical shape by the time we finished, but needed more work at home:

Exploring Different Pod Shapes

June 3, 2017 zedster66 Comments 15 comments

We have another Guest Post by Tracey from the Forum today.

I wanted to carry on exploring how to make different shaped pods by altering the shape of the resists. I thought a stone shape may open up new possibilities regarding the surface design. I have always used pond liner for my resists, I think it is perfect for the job, especially as we had a lot left over from pond construction! Here is the resist, it roughly measures 15.5” x 10.5”.

As before I placed six layers of Merino wool either side of the resist and here it is wetted down with yellow and orange silk hankies as decoration, the colour of the wool is a lovely rust so I thought how this would compliment it.

After lots of hard work felting, I cut a cross to take the resist out, it is a small hole, luckily I have small hands to get inside to start the fulling!

Once it was fulled, I packed it with fabric to help it dry out, by doing this it creates ‘memory’ and hopefully retains the shape you want it to be. When it was dry I had plans to decorate it slightly with some Mother of Pearl nugget shell beads that needed a home, the colour matched perfectly. Here is the finished pod.

Because by then, I definitely had the bug, I made more.

When I am layering the wool, I try to lay it neither too thinly or too thickly, but evenly of course. I was putting down six layers of wool each side of the resist as I have mentioned before. However, when I have held my pods I feel that the very bottom ‘gives’ a little, even though I work them until my shoulders and arms ache!, so I was not very happy with this. I decided to go to seven layers, a lot of wool!, but I am far happier with the outcome, much sturdier and thicker of course!

I then decided to change the shape of the resist once again and cut an oval shape, this one measures 16.5” x 13.5”.

For this design I put down four layers of Merino each side, wetting down each time. I then added two small circles of resist to reveal craters in the end design, with a different colour underneath. Here is the picture, I didn’t realise at the time but it looks like a happy grinning martian! I then continued with the remaining three layers each side.

I then decorated it with lots of lovely Blue Faced Leicester locks and wool nepps.

Lots of hard felting and fulling later, here it is, with a little bead detail.

Different Shaped Pods From Circular Resists

May 6, 2017 zedster66 Comments 21 comments

Today we have the first of a few guest posts from our forum member Tracey.

I am very interested in the different ways that pods and vessels can be shaped, often seeing a felted piece and thinking ‘what shape resist did they use?’
The first pod pictured here was made using a 12” diameter round resist. It has six layers of blended Merino wool each side, and it is embellished with silk yarn and mulberry silks. I cut a 3” slit in the centre to extract the resist once fulled, and it resulted in an oval opening. A crossed slit would make the opening more rounded, or you can just cut a small circle. It is always better to start small, you can then make the opening bigger if required.

I also made a seashore pod. This was made the same way as the green pod but I think the resist was about 19” diameter, quite big! I blended blues to replicate the sea and added white silk caps and curly locks to hopefully look like the crashing waves. I then sewed a few shells and sea glass onto the beach, using invisible thread.

Then as an experiment, I felted over another slightly smaller resist of 10” diameter, decorated it with silk caps and silk tops. This time I cut the opening to extract the resist on the outer edge of the circle, so the bottom of the ‘vase’ is the opposite side to the cut, and here is the result.