My newly found passion for felting has developed further since last post.
Border Leicester / Cheviot blend
A friend who prepares and spins yarns ,. came for a coffee and brought these ( locally produced) fleeces with her.
She also needed a good home for this Hebridean fleece.....
Hebridean (in it's raw state)
Although I appreciate it may not be everyone's cup of tea to don rubber gloves and get stuck in to cleaning and preparing a mucky fleece, but it gave me the chance and experience of getting the feel of my raw materials. After several gentle washes and rinses, followed by carding (using two grooming brushes/currycombs) ! It looked and felt ( no pun intended ! ) lovely. Quite coarse, but soft and springy. Visually, it resembled wire wool, however this was very deceptive. This photo was taken after it had been layered and wet felted with some Border Leicester / cheviot blend. It didn't felt down well, however the different textures were interesting.
To have left it at this stage, I wondered how it would fare in the using; so took the plunge and machine washed the piece. The result was quite acceptable. Still retaining a degree of various textures.
I also tried some needle felting with it. The result here was: soft and spongy. Very tactile but would need a solid core for sculptural work.
Note to jewellery makers...( Tammy girl)...it makes a wonderful natural buffer !
If you get any offcuts... It looks way too pretty to use as a polishing cloth.
ReplyDeleteGlad to see you still experimenting with different wools and techniques....I think that is half the fun of felting . I find that sometimes putting my wet, simi-felted items in the dryer will make them very felted...not good if you want something soft like a scarf but great for bags, just expect lots of shrinking because the heat and tumbeling really make a hard felt .
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