The Accidental Smallholder Forum
Food & crafts => Crafts => Topic started by: Lesley Silvester on May 28, 2013, 09:57:09 pm
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While I was at the farm park yesterday, I visited a felt stall where they were giving wet felt making lessons. Now I fancy having a go. Has anyone tried either wet or needle felting (I fancy both) and how did you get on?
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I've done wet-felting and it was very good and easy. The trick is to keep it colourful and put the fleece on very thinly, to avoid the 'mustard coloured clumpy stuff' I remember from 70s craft fairs! I use a bamboo blind and bubble wrap to roll it and agitate it. technique here (http://www.feltbetter.com/feltMaking.asp) In section 5, you roll the felt back and forth inside the blind, like a rolling pin.
Our WSD Guild has a 'felt vessels' workshop next month which I'm signed up for.
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Oh! I want to do the felt vessels workshop too, but was at the Spinners' Gathering this month so missed our Guild meeting - do you know who is organising it and I'll email them?
The other type of felting I want to do is felt art - I think I'll love that. Needle felting doesn't appeal to me at all, it looks like a lot of work to achieve anything, and is likely to be the sort of thing I am awful at! :D
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I can picture the lady and think she might be another Judith but I'm really not sure. I would have thought if you email Judith Edwards she'd know and put you in touch.
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I've done some wet felting. Like JayKay I use bubblewrap but towels instead of a blind. Personally, I prefer knitting and then felting.
I do a lot of needle felting. I like to decorate my felted items and it's easy to do although you have to watch your fingers as those needles are sharp! I often use cookie cutters to get the shapes I want.
I have needle felted a few objects such as sheep or pigs but I really prefer to use it for embellishment.
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I've done wet felting onto soaps - it's very easy and straighforward :thumbsup:
But I've not tried making a sheet of felt......yet ;)
I was at a show at the weekend and met a lovely couple with alpaca's. The lady had a sheet of felt made from alpaca - it was sooooo soft and stunning to look at. SO good in fact, I had to buy a wee bag of fibre to have a go with myself (sometime ! ;D) :innocent:
I love the look of needle felting, but like Sally, suspect it would be quite time consuming and possibly not suited to me ::) (I see lots of needled fingers)
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I've done a bit of both. So far just made a wall hanging with wet felting but want to make a hat and also some slippers. I think I will need more lessons before then though.
Needle felting is easy and less messy. I haven't done much with it but did felt some random shapes onto a bag for my niece and it looked lovely.
I was at a spring fayre where the woman had a stall of needle felted animals, horses, pigs, dogs, sheep etc. She had only been doing it for 6 months but was obviously hooked. They were good too.
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Hi I have been doing wet felting on and off for years - it is fantastic and very versatile making all sorts including hats slippers pictures, cushions and vessels. I have done a wee bit of needle felting to add detail to pictures but much prefer wet felting.
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I do needle felting. I make 3d things for my boys to play with. It's quite easy and I like that fact that I can do a bit then put it away for a while before I continue as I don't often get a long stretch of time to do things. It also means I can rest my joints a bit by doing it in small stages.
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I think the ladies on the stall had items that were wet felted with some decoration added by needle felting. What I really liked was some bowls made by wet felting and I would love to do one of those.
Just remembered, there was someone at the Smallholders' Show who was needle felting a whole picture but that did look like hard work.
You've all convinced me. I'm going for it. :excited:
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Lesley - are you mobile? Come and have a day here! I LOVE felting and dabble in all. Made a very pleasing bowl last year, but my BEST ever felt project is welly liners!!! Made my winter! I quite like felting beads too for jewelry. I think needle felting is very satisfying because its much quicker (and portable) than wet felting and great for small objects (Christmas tree decos etc).
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Never done any felting but it is on my list of things to try once we have moved. Has anyone got any pics of things they have done?
Helen
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I have made bowls - they are good fun to make i find the best results i got were using a resist
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I have made bowls - they are good fun to make i find the best results i got were using a resist
Can you explain what a resist is please
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Lesley - are you mobile? Come and have a day here! I LOVE felting and dabble in all. Made a very pleasing bowl last year, but my BEST ever felt project is welly liners!!! Made my winter! I quite like felting beads too for jewelry. I think needle felting is very satisfying because its much quicker (and portable) than wet felting and great for small objects (Christmas tree decos etc).
I'd love to. It's about an hour and a half drive which is close to my maximum for driving these days (a great improvement on a few months ago. Let me know when is convenient. ;D
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I've done quite a bit of wet felting in recent years, scarves, bags, hats, slippers, felt vessels, various containers for specific items, phone holder.. It's great fun - I tend to use bubble wrap and a towel for most things but have borrowed a cane type bamboo blind for larger items and things that need extra strength. I advertised on freecycle to try and get a couple for myself but no joy yet and my friend is happy to loan me hers when needed.
I keep trying to learn needle felting but am not sure I've the patience to do detailed work over a long period - may find out today at the friend's shops' 10th anniversary as they're doing demos and tasters. It would be good to have something simple and repetitive to do while watching TV rather than have to set up the kitchen table and stand over it.. as long as I don't end up stabbing myself with a needle of course!
Felt welly liners sounds great - I've done slippers but am assuming you mean long leg like knee socks or even over the wellietop and turned over? Details would be good FiB please :)
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I'm booked onto our Guild's 'felted vessels' workshop now, and have to take some things along with me, including a bamboo mat and bubble wrap. The tutor says she gets her bamboo mats in charity shops; she's not very computer savvy so probably won't try eBay.
What size bubble wrap will I need? I have some of the small bubble stuff and some with the larger bubbles - I'm guessing it'll be the smaller I want?
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I use small bubble type, large may work for some folk but I've always used the small..
For size, it depends what size vessel you're making ;) You want space for that size plus the shrinkage allowance plus a decent margin, and obviously x2 pieces more or less the same size, but not so big you can't flip the piece over. The vessel course I did we were using maybe a foot square or a little more but maybe if you're not sure just take a large sheet you can cut to the required size on the day?
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Thanks ellied. :) One of the other things we have to take is a balloon, so I'm guessing I'll need enough bubble wrap to cover the balloon... ;) :D
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Ooh that sounds interesting, Sally.
To those who know what they're doing, I've got a piece of that rubber non-slip mesh that stops plates sliding on trays. Would that do instead of bamboo?
The ladies who were doing the class at the farm park are prepared to do a class in my home, either wet or needle felting at £30 per person for the day, all materials provided. Does that sound reasonable? They usually charge £40 pp but arranged a special price of £20 pp for my spinning group. As I'm a member they will give my group the discount. I don't know if I can get enough people to get a class going here. If not, I may have to wait til they come to the spinning group but that won't be until the autumn. Not sure I can wait that long. :excited:
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£30 for a days felting inc materials sounds brill - one of my fave ways to spend a day! I never use a bamboo mat (mostly because I don't have one!! But also one of the ladies I learnt from didn't either!) I just use bubble wrap - but even that isn't really necessary - when I do soap or pebble felting in the woods we just use soap and water (and a bit of net curtain if I remember). My felt welly liners were only insoles - but they were VERY beautiful and VERY thick!!! (but I like the idea of full welly liners!)
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I MUST come and see you and get ideas. Will PM.
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I've just ordered polystyrene show lasts for making felted slippers. Can't wait for them to arrive :excited: :excited:
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I decided to have a go at felting soaps, I have half cheated and bought a 'kit' from ebay....hoping to suss out what I'm doing so that when the singing shearer visits I'll know what to do with all these fleeces!!