wet felting – Felting and Fiber Studio

Photo shows a close up of a wet felted Wallhanging.

The Passage of Time

February 19, 2026 Karen Lane Comments 24 comments

I thought I’d show a few things I’ve been up to since my last post in December, starting with some pendants.
A while ago I did an online workshop with feltmaker Aniko Boros to make her beautiful wet felted Fuchsia pendant. It wasn’t my intention to carry in making more fuchsias but rather to learn Anikos technique for making complex pendants so I could apply it to my own designs. And so the fuchsia led to this yellow/grey pendant which in turn has led to a recent request from Region 8 of the International Feltmakers Association to teach how to make it.

I was concerned that some in the group I will be teaching may not be used to working with Superfine fibre on such a fiddly scale, so over the Christmas/New Year period I created three more sample pendants. Two of these involve some different techniques to Aniko’s, making them easier and quicker to create than my grey one, but they will produce a similar look. The third sample is made without resists and aimed more for absolute beginners, just in case we have any attend. The other obvious difference with these new samples is the addition of beading which can be optional. I’m looking forward to teaching this class on the 8th March.

Another project I’ve been working on recently is a planned IFA exhibition of Feltmaking titled Felt Connected: Bringing People and Fibre Together. It came about after we surveyed Region 8 members as to what they wanted from their Regional Coordinators and one of our members, Jo Cook, suggested we organise an exhibition of members work. Since then Jo and I have been working together to organise the event which will take place next month in Harding House Gallery in Lincoln. We have a total of 17 IFA members taking part with the aim of not only showcasing their talent but demonstrating the versatility of fibre and what can be done with it while at the same time promoting the IFA and hopefully attracting more members. If you are in the area we will be holding a Meet the Artists session from 1pm – 3pm on Saturday 14th March and it would be great to see you there.

Earlier this month I started work on The Passage of Time, my submission for the IFA 2026 online exhibition “Time” that launches during our AGM on March 28th. When I first read the theme title I have to admit that for a day or two I struggled to see anything other than clocks! Then I had a lightbulb moment, I’d make an Ouroboros, the mythical serpent that is often represented in Alchemy art depicted eating its own tail. It’s a symbol of the cyclical nature of time, the universe, and self-renewal and represents the concept of eternity and endless return. Image source: https://www.bbc.co.uk/culture/article/20171204-the-ancient-symbol-that-spanned-millennia

I created my 3D mobius wet felted version using Merino fibre but when it came to photographing it, no matter what angle I took it from, it looked really dull and boring. So I abandoned that idea and instead I’ve taken inspiration from the beautiful sandstone slabs on Seahouses beach in Northumberland. Coastal erosion and fossils are both dramatic indicators of the passage of time so seemed a fitting replacement for the failed Ouroboros!

The base is a mix of Carded Corriedale and Bergschaf fibre with silk fabrics, wallpaper, Tyvek, free motion stitch and hand embroidery. I’ve included a piece of felt I made a few years ago which mimics fossils, it’s one of two experimental samples I made and didn’t get around to using until now. After auditioning both of them in the pre-made hole I went with the darker option, which doesn’t look as dark in the flesh as it does in the photo. I’ve submitted this piece for the online exhibition but I’ve since felted another slab to add to the first one. It will be embellished in a similar way, to create a larger piece of work for another exhibition that Jo and I are hoping to launch in July.

I’ll leave you with a piece of work that was created by a lovely lady called Avie, also known as The Curly Sheep. Avie came to spend a day with me last month to learn how to wet felt a picture and how to do free motion stitch. Turns out she’s a natural at both as I’m sure you will agree!

MAD Museum & a Felted Shell

April 30, 2025 Karen Lane Comments 21 comments

Back in March Mark announced that he fancied taking up a new hobby and was thinking of having a go at making automata or possibly creating “gravity art”. He’d been looking at examples online of incredible, complex rolling ball creations by a guy who goes by the name of Copper Gravity. I love anything like this so did a bit of my own googling and discovered there’s a place in Stratford on Avon called The MAD (Mechanical Art & Design) Museum that showcases this type of art. If you look at their website you might get the impression that it’s geared for children, and maybe it is, but on the day I visited there wasn’t a kiddie in sight…..it was all adults having a great time marvelling at the exhibits!
Stratford isn’t exactly on the doorstep but I knew I would be down that way mid March to run a workshop so decided to plan my visit around that. On arriving in the town the first hurdle was to find the entrance which is very discreet. Even with Google maps telling me I was in the right place I walked past the museums narrow open door a couple of times before spotting it! On the positive side, having walked in the wrong direction to begin with, I did get to see Shakespeare’s birthplace.

The museum exhibits range from very simple to incredibly complex with everything in between and in front of each exhibit is a button which you wave your hand over to start the automata working. If I tell you the vibe is a mix of Wallis and Gromit, Heath Robinson and Scrapheap Challenge you’ll get the idea.
Some of the pieces are behind glass, which made it difficult to video them, but hopefully you can get the gist of this one. Keep your eyes on the tank and the rabbit!

There were several clocks on display but I thought this one, Gold Clock by Gordon Bradt, was particularly beautiful…..

The majority of pieces were displayed on open shelving. This submarine and its wonderfully weird operatives has to be my favourite! There is so much going on here and it’s quite hypnotic the way those little characters move. I would love Mark to make something like this, but I’m not holding my breath!

The “Platform Lift” by Keith Newstead was amusing and this was very “Wallace and Gromit”…..

Some of the exhibits are wall hanging and I loved this one by Chris & Angela Margett. It has three cheeky gremlins defacing a portrait of Shakespeare, Stratford on Avons most recognised figure!

Although the museum is small it’s jam packed with exhibits as well as having a small cinematic area playing a fascinating video and there’s a small shop selling automata kits and souvenirs. I must have spent over two hours in there and absolutely loved it!

The following day I was at Stitching Kitchen in Brackley to teach my Wet Felted Chickens. This was my second visit to this venue run by a lovely lady called Hannah Thompson. I had six students which meant plenty of one to one time and they all worked really hard to get their birds finished in the time allowed. What was all the more impressive was that two of the ladies had never wet felted before!

I’ve done very little felting since my last post but I have been collecting images of shells and thinking about how I can interpret those as “Structures” for Waltham Textile Groups next exhibition. This image inspired my first wet felted Conch shell.

The Conch is a medium to large sea snail which inhabits the Indo-West Pacific. This is my wet felted version of the Conch made from Corriedale, Merino, sari silk and paint. It’s approximately 25cm x 12cm.

Hopefully I will have a few more shells to share next time…..or maybe I’ll have gone off at a tangent and be doing something completely different, who knows!

Connections

March 1, 2025 Karen Lane Comments 22 comments

I know that some of our readers are members of the International Feltmakers Association and therefore know all about our upcoming exhibition “Connections”. For those of you who don’t, the Feltmakers organisation uses their AGM at the end of March as the launch for a themed annual online exhibition to showcase our members work. The wonderful thing about these events is that they are not juried, there is no right or wrong so no one is judged, it’s open to any ability and how you interpret each theme is entirely up to you. All of the online exhibitions can be viewed by anyone, not just members, simply visit Feltmakers.com and click on Our Feltmakers from the menu and then choose Online Exhibitions. Last year’s theme was Hats Off! Hats and fascinators are simply sculptures for the head so we could let our imaginations run riot and you can see the wide variety of headwear created for that event here.

For me this year’s brief took more thought as there are so many different ways it could be approached…..”you can find connections in the way you interact with other feltmakers, in the way you are inspired by nature, other mediums or other artists. You can also explore the literal: how can I connect one part of the felt to another?”

I finally whittled my thoughts down to two ideas. The first would take the form of another head piece, because I’m developing a bit of a thing for fascinators, and the second would be a 3D vessel.

I am a huge fan of the Dutch Feltmaker and Milliner Saar Snoek. Saar has a different approach to many other feltmakers I know and her imagination and creativity when it comes to felted headwear is phenomenal!

Some of Saar Snoek’s amazing wet felted headwear.

How I approached my Fascinator might sound like a cop out to some of you but remember the theme of the exhibition is Connections🤩 So rather than start from scratch I decided to “connect” three existing pieces of my own to create a Fascinator, these are pieces that were never intended to be worn on the head. One of these was originally designed as necklace which I’ve worn on several occasions along with the second piece which was a matching bracelet. They were both Nuno felted, stitched, embellished with beads and backed with fabric.

Next I looked around for something suitable to top off my head piece. I’d been working with organza earlier that day so auditioned a piece of that but decided against it. It needed something with much more impact!

I’d previously made a blue version of the Splash, inspired by the wonderful Australian feltmaker Pam de Groot, and thought I’d try that out for size. Although it was far too floppy at this stage I could envisage it working as the third piece of the Fascinator. I used acrylic paint to colour it to complement the other two pieces and to give it enough rigidity to keep its shape.

Next I removed the necklace chain and invisibly stitched everything together.The final stage was to attach it to a gold metal headband repurposed from another project and then talk a friend into modelling it for me. Fortunately Maria was all for it and I think she really suits it too!

For my second piece I started by sketching a variety of shapes including cords, spikes and balls which could be used to join individual pieces of flat felt in a decorative way. While I was considering how this would look my design changed several times and ended up becoming a four sided hinged structure. At this point I realised it would be a good project for Waltham Windmills next challenge which is Structures. So having only made four connectors I decided to park that design for now and moved on to plan B.

The first four connectors are now being saved for another project

Plan B was based on a very rough sketch but became more of a “let’s make a start and see where it goes” sort of plan to avoid any more procrastination!!

I started with an egg shaped resist, covered it in green and grey Merino fibre and worked it to prefelt. Various thicknesses of hand made prefelt and fully felted offcuts were then arranged on one side and covered with a thin layer of white Corriedale fibre. At that point I decided to add the grey concertina protrusion before attaching the ropes, balls, cords and several other pieces of prefelt on the top side. In all I connected at least 60 separate pieces of felt as well as small pebbles, acrylic wallpaper and dried seaweed. It’s very tactile and I’ve left it hollow so it can be pushed and pulled and reshaped allowing the viewer to also connect with it.

I hope you’ll take the time to visit the Feltmakers website after the 29th March and see the exhibition for yourself.

Christmas bells, beeswax and wonky masking tape!

December 19, 2024 helenefeltzen Comments 23 comments

Happy Christmas everyone! At the moment you are probably up to your eyes getting ready for the days of festivities which lie ahead. So, I will give you a few options here. Here is a slideshow of my blog which you can go through in a few minutes if you are stuck for time. Alternatively you can read my narrative or if you have a while to spare why not grab a cuppa, pull up a chair, watch the slideshow and read the narrative!

I covered the resist with orange viscose and two layers of red merino
Then I added silk paper I made. I didn’t like it so I pulled it off when it was at prefelt stage
This is the lid of the furniture polish I used to shape my bells
Here they are after drying. I cut them to size as they were rather long
Here is a view of the inside of one of the bells
I rolled the bottom edge to show the orange viscose
I pinned the soluble paper to the bell and drew my pattern
I cut back the excess paper ones I had stitched the pattern
Then I added the beads
Here they are ready for dunking
The paper dissolved once the water hit it!
Then I crocheted the ‘rope’ I painted the silver bells with some bronze nail varnish
Here they are, ready to go!
A detail of the free motion machine embroidery and beading on the tree
Disaster struck using masking tape on the inside of the card. Back to the drawing board
I stippled the card using a stencil brush and red then gold paint
Inside the card (no masking tape this time!)
A selection of handmade Nepalese paper for Karen to play with
All packed in the box
Here’s the finished card which I glued to the lid of the box
All ready for posting
And finally, here they are, on Karen’s beautiful Christmas tree

I was so delighted when I drew Karen in the Christmas card exchange this year. I was also a bit daunted as I have been going through a bit of a dry patch creatively over the past number of months. I knew I wanted to do something that ‘stood out’ (in other words 3D) but this can be a bit of a challenge when it comes to postal systems.

While searching through one of my fibre presses I came across a deep small box that I had used to transfer a porcelain bowl home from my holiday in NZ earlier in the year. We won’t even talk about how my weird creative mind works but seeing the box instantly brought to mind bells so, decision made, I got to work on them.

First I made my resist. I intended making two bells. I covered the resist in an orange viscose fibre and then laid two layers of red merino on top. I added a hanging loop to each bell and some silk paper to each bell which I later pulled off as I didn’t like it. Once prefelted I cut through the resist to make two shapes and then started working on shrinking and shaping. Next, I searched for a suitable bell shape which I could use for the next stage. That’s where the beeswax came in! The lid is shaped like an old fashioned beehive which is an ideal shape to work with. Lots of rubbing and shaping ensued (and I will admit a bit of cutting as the shapes were too long), until I ended up with bell shapes I was happy with. Then I rolled the bases so that the orange showed on the outside.

I decided I wanted a simple embroidered design on each bell. I drew my tiny design on water soluble paper and added my stitches and a few beads to each bell. Then I dissolved the paper and reshaped the bell on the top of my little beehive! Once dry, I got to work on the ‘rope’ and the bell. My little jingle bells were silver and I had been searching, to no avail for gold ones which I thought would look better. Then I thought of using some nail varnish on the outside of the bells. Worked a treat! I then took some cotton embroidery thread and made the ‘rope’ which I attached to the body of the bell and to the inside of the little ‘jingle’. Then I threaded ribbon through the loop at the top of each bell so that Karen could hang them up. They fitted nicely into the box but I felt there was something missing. So I added a few little squares of Nepalese paper which I thought Karen might like to experiment with. Some of these are quite a lot heavier than the usual ones which are used in felting but I have managed to felt them into pieces. I thought she might have fun trying them out.

Next to the card. My cards were the same size as the box so I thought it might be fun to attach it to the box when it was ready. I opted for a monochrome effect to start with; I prefelted a tree which was made from black merino and margillan silk. Then I laid the tree onto a white merino background and felted the lot together. Once fulled, I cut it to size. Then it was decorating time which I did on my sewing machine using free motion embroidery. I added some beads too.

Time to address the card! I stippled the outside of the card with a stencil brush using red and then gold paint. Then I decided to do the same on the inside but got too creative and used masking tape so I could control the area where I was adding the colour. Once happy, I went to remove the masking tape. Disaster! It took away a goodly portion of the card too. I was not a happy bunny! On to the second attempt with the card (without masking tape this time), I was more successful. All done and ready for the post.

Karen has received her card today and I got mine from her yesterday. I love my card. Karen has gone to such detail with it I am going to treasure it. Like Lindsay’s card from a previous swap, it will be putting in an annual appearance at Christmas time.

I love the concept of the card swap. It keeps my felting friends close in my heart, especially at this time of year. Thank you to Ann who organised it and us.

Wishing everyone a merry Christmas and a happy, healthy and peaceful 2025!

Helene

A Few Felt Samples

November 12, 2024 Shepherdessann Comments 12 comments

I am out of time to do an original post today. So it’s a throwback post. This one is from the early days of 2012.

Doing samples is fun and I still have the last two. They are just fun to have.

I haven’t been doing much that is interesting to look at lately. Everything is white and is waiting for the dye pot. I thought I would show you some samples I made a little while ago. The first 2 are purple merino with some silk strips on them. I thought they came out nicely with lots of texture.

purple samples — Purple wool with strips of silk before felting

purple samples fin — Purple samples after felting

The second is orange merino with some silk and curls on it, here I wanted to felt the curls right into the background. I also wanted to see how it would stick if I put it over the silk. I really like the way the little blob of curls all became one with nice texture. The curls going across the silk stuck down very well. Enough wool migrated through the silk to grab the courser wool of the curls.

Orange sample — Orange wool with silk and curls before felting

orange sample fin — Orange sample after felting

This last set I wanted the curls to be attached at the base and left loose and hanging for the rest of their length. I use a small piece of scrap floor underlay with a hole in it so the wouldn’t stick down. It worked very well. I am not sure how I ended up with one really long curl.

p and o lock samples — Small samples with curls with their resists on before felting

p and o lock samples fin — Small samples with curls after felting.

I am not sure what I am gong to do with these. I might make some buttons or hair clips. Do you have any ideas?

A Hat Workshop

November 3, 2024 Shepherdessann Comments 12 comments

A couple of weeks ago I did a hat class in a small town near me, Spencerville. It is a great little gallery with some workshop space. https://www.spencerstreetmuse.ca/

I had 4 students including the owner. These are the samples I brought to show some possibilities. Sorry for the bad picture, I had to cut it out of one of the other pictures. The 3 ladies all picked the same style of hat, the black and blue one in the middle.

And the gentleman wanted a wizard’s hat for part of a costume. Nothing too tall so we were good for space and time.

You know the drill first you lay out all the wool.

Then you wet it and rub it with Tupperware juice jug lids on top of the bubble wrap. Two of them are getting great patterns in their bubbles. You can see the shape of the wizard hat bottom right.

Then there is the rolling.

Next is the scariest part for most new people…..the cutting.

Then we moved on to more rolling and then some scrunching and a little tossing to get them down to the right size. I do have some basic hat blocks but I make people try them on to see if they fit like they want them to. Then we can fine-tune them before the final shaping. At this point, the gentleman had to leave to make it to work on time so I gave him some information and told him to contact me if he needed help. So no more pictures of his hat.

And the finished hats, they all turned out really well. And one of the ladies bout the black and blue sample hat so I will have to make another.

Sorry for the sort of quick post with not much info but our Guild Sale and Exhibition is this weekend and I am in charge( silly people letting that happen). We will be on our second and last day when you read this.

Leafy Seadragon

June 24, 2024 Karen Lane Comments 31 comments

Several of my recent posts have been about the work that was being created by members of the Waltham Textile group for our Making Waves Exhibition. It’s been about six weeks now since that took place so many of our readers will have already seen images, and possibly the video, but if you haven’t, and you’re interested, you can view them on Facebook or Instagram.

Something else I had wanted to make for the show, but didn’t make time for, was a felted Leafy Seadragon. I discovered so many weird and wonderful sea creatures while researching for the exhibition but this species is in a category of its own!!

The ethereal looking Leafy Seadragon has leaf-like appendages that provide camouflage for this delicate creature — Image source: Treehugger.com

Leafy seadragons inhabit rocky reefs, seaweed beds, and seagrass meadows in waters off the coast of South Australia, where they have been adopted as the state’s marine emblem.

These timid creatures grow to between 20 and 30cm in length. They use their ornate leaf-like appendages as very effective camouflage to blend in with their surroundings, becoming almost invisible to the untrained eye.

Belonging to the same family as seahorses and pipefish, Australian leafy seadragons are generally brown to yellow in body colour, while their spectacular appendages are typically olive-tinted and provide near-perfect camouflage in seaweed. Depending on the age and health of the individual some Leafies can also change their colouration if they need to.

The leaf-like structures are not used for swimming. They move very slowly using their pectoral and dorsal fins which are so delicate they are almost transparent.

So I thought I’d have a go at making a Leafie this month and I’m hoping there will be space for me to display her as part of my submission to “Water“ – the 2024 Lincs Textiles Exhibition in Lincoln Cathedral at the end of August. Our work will be on show in the Chapter House at the Cathedral so if you are in the vicinity it would be lovely to see you there!
I know these creatures are normally pictured horizontally but for aesthetic purposes I’m using artistic lisence and hanging mine vertically! So, would it be wet felted and stuffed or needle felted? I liked the idea of wet felting the body but decided against it as I didn’t think it would provide enough support for the appendages.

Best to start with a 1.2mm galvanised wire armature and needle felt the body…..but what was I thinking when I switched to 0.5mm aluminium wire for the appendages? I was thinking I could form the leaf shapes using that wire and fill them in with painted lutradur……what I wasn’t thinking was that they would twist and bend and drive me nuts all the time I was needle felting the body! That wire was making the whole thing too fragile and too difficult to work with so it had to go!

It was replaced with 0.6mmgalvanised wire which, being retro fitted, would now require careful poking and anchoring to ensure they all stayed put! This also meant the leaf/seaweed shapes would need a rethink. They wouldn’t be outlined with wire, as I’d originally intended, because the replacement wire was far too stiff for that. But at least it was easier to work on now!

I began adding detail and colour to the head. When I was happy with that I moved on to wet felting several boney spikes to attach in rows along the back, front and sides and then needle felted colour to the body.

Next the new wires that will hold the foliage were wrapped with fibre and I made flat felt to cut up for the leaves.

This is where I’m at right now. There’s more foliage to add and the de-fuzzing to do so I’ll include a photo of the finished dragon in my next post. In the meantime I just have to share some inspiring Leafie sculptures I came across online.

I was blown away by the beautiful design and detail in these first two which are the work of artist Ellen Jewett Ellen says “Each sculpture is constructed using an additive technique, layered from inside to out by an accumulation of innumerable tiny components. Many of these components are microcosmic representations of plants, animals and objects. Some are beautiful, some are grotesque and some are fantastical. The singularity of each sculpture is the sum total of its small narrative structures.”

In addition to her life as a professional artist Ellen operates a small scale animal refuge with the help of her partner on their Vancouver Island farm.

I also like this one made by Australian artist Dean Fox using recycled copper and brass on natural rock…… “I am much inspired by the beautiful environment of Kangaroo Island in South Australia where I live. The beaches and bush alike are a constant source of ideas and materials. During my working life in the building and metalwork industry I learnt the many skills I now employ in my creative work. I work in metal, copper and brass and may incorporate found objects and natural timber into my work.”

Mine is still very much a WIP but in my head I’m already working on a more abstract version for Leafie number two which may or may not involve fibre.

Exhibitions

May 9, 2024 Lindsay Wilkinson Artwork Comments 11 comments

In my previous blogs this year, I’ve charted my progress in preparing for a big exhibition of my work in a Michelin starred pub/restaurant (The Sportsman, Seasalter) along the coast from where I live. Making the work was a big undertaking. Since I last wrote, I’ve set up the six-week exhibition and as I press the button on this blog, it still has a few days left to run.

I confess I’ve done no felt-making since I set up this exhibition so I’m going to show you what I have of this event, plus a few photos of another exhibition I had at the same time.

I’m apologising in advance as these aren’t great photos. I took them more as a record for myself rather than trying to capture the feel. The light is very yellow and they don’t do the venue justice. Once I’d set up the pictures, I had a lovely private view with about 35 friends and family. Alas, I took no photos of that as I was thinking about being the host. I did, however, get a nice picture of my daughter and husband in that uncomfortable space when you’re waiting for things to start and worrying in case no one comes to your party

The Sportsman has 3 linked dining areas & a corridor

These are some images from room 1

Room 2 is the largest room

Room 3, which backs onto the kitchen garden

And finally the corridor

Looking at these, I haven’t included everything but I hope you get the idea.

I’m delighted to say that 6 pictures have sold.

While the Sportsman exhibition was in progress, I also had a week in the hut in Whitstable harbour. I was a bit short of felt pictures so I included some 3D work and some of my photographs.

I’ve been thinking about what to do next and pondering some more 3D work. For now, I’m really happy to have got these exhibitions done.

Something Fishy

March 26, 2024 Karen Lane Comments 26 comments

Last year I joined Lincolnshire Textiles, a mixed media textile group who meet monthly at Cherry Willingham near Lincoln. This is an exhibiting group and I was really impressed when I visited their last group exhibition which was held two years ago in Lincoln Cathedral. As well as members exhibiting their individual pieces, central to the displays is always a group piece. Last time this was Sapphire & Steel which you can see here.

This year the main theme of the exhibition is “Water” and the group piece will represent a whirlpool with 30(ish) members having contributed a section each. Along with a template we were each given a colour swatch and asked to work in shades of that colour without going too dark or light either way. This was my template for shape which is approx 60cm x 15cm at its widest parts, and the little colour swatch of thread.

My first thought was to fill the shape with swirls or crashing waves……
But then I remembered seeing some of the pieces that had been submitted at previous meetings and two or three other members had already worked on that type of design, so I decided to rethink.

The other thing that came to mind was that my section might lend itself to being the shape of a fish so that’s what I decided on…..

The next step was to gather various threads that looked like they might be suitable and then look for different textured fabrics which I could colour. As we were asked to work in monotone it would be important to use as many textures as possible so I pulled out cotton, velour, interfacing, tulle, Lutradur, Evolon, gauze, elastic and crepe bandage.

I mixed up a shade of green that was as near as possible to the swatch and applied it to the fabrics in varying strengths. This gave me a nice variety of shades and texture to work with.

Knowing our exhibition isn’t until August I thought I had plenty of time but at our meeting this month I discovered I was one of only two who hadn’t yet handed their work in and it would be needed for the April meeting!! Panic set in and I didn’t think to take many photos of my fish once I’d got going with it….it was a case of head down and get on with it!

This is the finished fish with the addition of beads which I’m hoping will catch the light and add interest. I certainly don’t envy Hilary who now has the job of joining all of our segments together and making them fit!!

Meanwhile things are still progressing with Waltham Textiles “Making Waves” theme and I’ve added a Coconut Octopus to my exhibits. I came across some fabulous photos of the Coconut Octopus and just had to have a go at creating it.

The coconut octopus is found in the western Pacific and Indian oceans and is classified as a tropical water species. It can be found off the coast of southern Japan as well as Australia, New Guinea, and South Africa.

It prefers shallow coastal waters and spends the majority of its time on the sandy or muddy seafloor close to the shoreline. This species also shows a preference for calmer waters as opposed to the swifter seas of the open ocean, hence it is frequently found in bays, lagoons, and other inlets.

It commonly preys upon shrimp, crabs, and clams, and displays unusual behavior including bipedal and quadrupedal walking. It gets its name from gathering and using coconut shells and seashells for shelter and protection. What an amazing creature!

Another distinctive feature of the coconut octopus is its suckers. They are almost white and really stick out when the creature has assumed a darker color. The contrast in colour between its body and its suckers can create a fluorescent effect for the suckers.

Unlike Oli I which was completely needle felted, Oli II is mainly wet felted with the skirt being added once I’d got him stuffed.

I considered making the legs and body separate and joining them with needle felting but decided to go with a book resist instead.

He’s made with Corriedale Slivers from World of Wool which I’ve been using a lot of lately. They are great for both needle felting and wet felting and are available in a beautiful range of colours.

He’s nearly finished, just a few more needle felted suckers to add, which has become a bit of a ritual when I’m sat watching TV. With so many of them it’s the only way I can do it and keep sane!! Now where did I put that needle…………?

The 30+ Day Folding Challenge

March 4, 2024 teriberry Comments 20 comments

If you follow my personal blog you probably already know that I set myself a challenge at the end of December:

To explore a different folded / pleated shape every day

In common with a lot of creatives, I tend to flit from one project to the next, not always finishing the first project before the next exciting, “new shiny thing” catches my attention. By setting myself this challenge I hoped to focus on one topic for a while and really push the boundaries to develop some new ideas, shapes and designs in felt-making.

This post is my edited highlights from the first 30 days of this challenge, if you would like to see the whole journey, all of the different shapes and more of the thought processes involved behind each piece please start here:

I have long been inspired by Andrea Noeske-Porada, a felt artist best known for her origami pieces. For years I had believed her to be the designer of the kaleidocyle:

This is my attempt to make one

But after my first post in this series, Henny van Tussenbroek got in touch, it turns out Andrea was just the first person to make one in felt, the original designer was in fact a Dutch mathematician-artist, (MC Escher) and author of this book:

Thank you Henny for sharing this information and correcting my assumption!

This book is a quite a slim volume but it is a fascinating read. I was lucky enough to find a second hand copy here in New Zealand and it is one of best creative books I own. If you would like some help to figure out the pattern for a kaleidocyle, I highly recommend getting a copy.