Wet felted Cuff

Cuff with Locks and Beads

This cuff was wet felted with natural Finn Wool and locks. It is embellished with black beads.

The closure is a decorative button on the backside.

Wet felted Vessel

Art Nouveau Vessel

The weather has cooled off a bit so I thought I would do an all day project. I already had this idea in my sketch book. I used Zinn Wool which works very well for vessels. On the top layer I added wisps of merino to make a variation of color. I allowed extra length in my resist pattern and three bump outs on the sides to accommodate the three folds. My resist included 3 multiple pieces taped together at the bottom to form the black extensions. They are not handles, just decorative design elements.

The vessel turned out pretty close to my sketch except for the black extensions. They were supposed to be free at the top but in order for them to be free I would or should have put wire in between the layers of wool so they had some strength and support. Instead I hand stitched the top edge of them to the vessel. I crimped them to give them an interesting shape and let them dry.

Detail of folds.

Bubble felting technique

Cuff and Brooch

I made a practice piece using wood balls to make bubbles in a piece of wet felting. I can't just let it be a sample. Had to make something out of it. I needle felted the purple rings around the bubbles. Poked the bubbles inward and sewed some beads in the center of each one. Put it around my wrist and decided to make a cuff out of it. I had some left over felted cord that I made into a hook an loop closure. I needle felted that on to the cuff.

I also made a single bubble in a small piece of wet felting. I turned that into a brooch. I needle felted some yarn around the bubble and poked in the center and added a decorative button in the indention. All it needs now is a brooch pin attached to the back.

Wet Felted Cuffs

Cuffs Are Great Technique Practice

The last couple of days it's been 100 plus temperature. Not exactly good felting weather. But with free time I worked on these cuffs as practice doing a couple textural 3d techniques. The green one I embedded felted balls into the base then cut away the top layer to reveal them. The green base was free form felted.

The next cuff I felted over a resist. I made the first layer of one side teal colored. Then did the other layers brown. I lightly felted the piece and then made 3 vertical slits on one side to reveal the teal inside and cut open one end to remove the resist. I continued to felt and full the piece keeping the flaps the slits created from felting closed. I rolled it a bit trying to shrink the length but only the width seemed to shrink. So I threw it in the dryer. I still didn't shrink much more. I ended up cutting about an inch off one end. No harm done. I added some beads, not the best, but all I had. I cut a button hole and added a button closure. Also on the top layer I added a strip of white roving and two borders of teal boucle hand dyed yarn.

Wet Felting Experiment

Experimental Wet Felting

Yesterday I did some experimental work. I wanted to felt around something 3d by wet felting, not needle felting. I wanted to make an abstract irregular shape. I tried to tie wool yarn around clumps of fiber fill in various areas. Then I covered that with wool roving, wet it down and started felting. The more I felted and the more it shrank, it turned into a ball about 5" across. I could not maintain the irregular shape. I need to figure a way to felt one area at a time I guess. Maybe it would work if I wrapped the fiber fill with silk fabric and tied in the shapes.

Anyway I ended up with this large ball/egg shape. So today I painted it with setasilk paint. I expected it to paint more solid but I think the fiber fill came more to the surface then I thought it would. So of course the paint did not adhere to the fiber fill only to the wool, giving it a very textural look. So now I call it my Thunder Egg. I had this felted stand I made for something else but it fit the egg perfectly. So much for experiments gone wrong!

If you wanted to make an egg filled with fiberfill and covered with felted wool roving it would be ideal for stitching and beading on.

Thunder Egg On Stand

Wet Felted Vessel with Shell Inclusions

Wet Felted Vessel with Seashell Inclusions

This vessel was wet felted using 3 layers of Natural Finn wool. Then I added the sea shells and next I placed some orange Merino wool over just the shells and placed some of the orange wool in thin strips flowing in and out and around the shells. I placed thin strips of thin plastics over the strips as a resist. Now I covered the orange strips with thin plastic strips as a resist and covered everything with one more layer of natural Finn wool.

I felted everything being careful to felt around and over the shells. Next I shrank and fulled the piece. I cut out the felt over the shells and made slits in the top layer of wool revealing the strips of orange wool and opening out the top layer edges. The shells are just on the front side but the strips continue around to the back side. I am trying to figure out a name for this one. Anyone have a suggestion?

"Untitled"

Flora Fountain Topper

Topper for Flora Fountain Vessel

Today I made an alternate topper for yesterday's vessel. I started out with a different plan but it shrank to small. So I decided to make the best of it not wanting to be wasteful. The black nob part that also goes down a couple of inches is the part that went wrong. I put a golf ball in it and fulled it to that shape and folded up from the bottom to make a thick edge around the bottom of the ball area. Next I felted a piece of the aqua colored wool in to an irregular square  shape. I cut a cross slit in the middle of this piece and slid the ball topper bottom thru the slit. That left 4 triangular tabs around the aqua area that I could needle felt to the black area. Now I was able to just gentle push the top into the top of the vessel forming another flange shape, repeating the flange on the vessel.

"Flora Fountain"

"Flora Fountain" Felted Vessel

One Piece Vessel with Flange

My project the last two days was this vessel. My intent was to create a vessel with a flared flange around the circumference.  I created the flange then placed it around the vessel with the lower unfelted edge placed at the middle of the vessel. This was placed after the 2nd layer of wool was wet down. Then I put two more layers of white on the top of the vessel. Then flipped up the flange and placed 2 more black wool layers on the bottom half of the vessel, overlapping the flange fluff edge to incorporate  it into the side of the vessel. Then I carefully began felting and rubbing making sure the flange remained free from the vessel 2/3 of the way up. I blew up a balloon inside to felt  and shape the vessel.

I'm playing around with embellishments. I had this felted flower I had already made in complimentary colors. The flower is not attached at this point. It can be removed. I placed an antique frog that just happened to fit in the opening and added some rope pieces I had felted earlier. I also needle felted some white locks around the top edge

"Flora Fountain"