rosiepink

More Wet Felt Making and lots of odds n ends!

Forgot to say last time that we are delighted to be the current 'Featured Artist' at Wingham Wool Work !  Go take a peek! 

I made some progress on my Spring Flowers picture by finally getting around to felting it - now I just need to wait for it to dry properly before I attack it with needles and threads and make it come alive!

Mum has also been busy and has created this lovely picture of a beached boat:

She was inspired after looking through some of our old holiday photos.  The boat hull and fence-post shapes were cut from handmade, grey pre-felt then placed on top of dry fibres that had been laid out for the background of beach, sea and sky before wet felting together. Machine stitching picked out the planking on the boat and made the wire on the fence-posts.

It is 65cm x 31cm.

As you know, mum and I have recently launched our eBook 'Creating Felt Artwork' and we’ve been so pleased to receive such a lot of positive feedback and sales already.  It has been really popular so far and we are really glad it is being well received after so much hard (but fun) work!

Some of you may already be familiar with a delightful blog Clasheen.  Nicola and Chrissie have also written a book called ‘From Felt to Friendship’ ...a glimpse into the working lives and inspiration of two totally dedicated felters...  Looks fabulous!

 

 

New felt picture in progress - Some handmade felt springy woolly felty flowers :)

Hello! On Saturday I stole back some time for myself and indulged in some creativity - Heaven!  I haven't been able to have much time for feltmaking recently so I really went to town given the opportunity - out came all the boxes of fibre goodness and fluff, and after lots of rummaging around in my stash of wool and wonders (think "child in sweet shop!") my workspace looked like a big colourful explosion in a fibre factory! After sifting through my inspiration box (and playing with the wool for a while, and after a lot of indecisiveness, and revisiting some of my scribbled and sketched ideas), I decided to lay out a picture of some bright felty spring flowers.  I used merino wool, prefelts, yarn and hand dyed scrim.

As I haven't made anything in a while, due to work commitments etc, the floodgates opened. Faced with 100s of colours of wool, lots of gorgeous wool yarns and fabrics and silks, it was hard not to go overboard (did I overcook it?) Initially I was just going to make a few little samples to play with but once I got going I thought I might as well make a nice big piece!
It is about 70 cm square before felting.


The great thing about felting is that there is no right or wrong way to do it.
How you make felt artwork is up to you - it doesn't have to be hardwearing or a specific size or thickness it just has to look nice. So thick or thin, small or large it doesn't matter - the key is to experiment!  And if something doesn't felt in how you want it to - then you can stitch over it later!

My picture is now sat on my table waiting to be felted.  Then I'm looking forward to getting out the sewing machine, embroidery threads, tapestry wools and yarns, and stitching into it.  I feel like going a little crazy on this one but maybe I should wait and see what it looks like felted first.

Have got an idea for my next piece (and several pieces after that!) but I am going to try to be good and at least felt this one before moving on to the next one!

Creating Felt Artwork eBook

Hello.  It's been a year since we last posted, but it really doesn't feel like it at all because it's been such a busy year!  One of the things we've done is to write our eBook about making felt artwork.  We began our eBook project quite a while ago and it's taken a lot of effort to finish but it's been fun along the way.  The reason for writing the eBook was because we often get asked if we run workshops to show how we make our felt art, but as these enquiries have come from all over the UK, it would be hard for us to make it work.  So instead we've written our eBook - so it could be like having a workshop in your own home!

The eBook comprises 60 pages of clear, step-by-step instructions with colour photographs and lots of handy hints and will enable you to create a version of our ‘Meadow’ (pictured below) or your own design using the same steps with additional information (if you would like more details about our eBook, please click the link at the top of the left hand column).

Flowers are one of our favourite themes for making felt artwork because there is so much room to play with colour and texture, and to create both abstraction and detail.  Now that Spring has sprung I have been taking lots of photos to feed into some new artwork ideas that I will hopefully be working on soon.  Will share the results of my endeavours here!

I also thought I'd share a picture of these lovely creatures, not because I think they will make it into any artwork soon, but because they are so cute!  They are dutifully guarding the grounds at Blenheim Palace, oh and trying to steal from picnics!

 

 

Happy Flowers

Hello, hope you are all well and enjoying the spring weather :)

 

Recently I was really pleased to be asked to make another commission meadow picture.  This one was approx 100cm x 50cm.  We often get asked about how we make our pictures, and the processes we use, so we are now working on an ebook on the subject of making felt artwork, that will be available from this blog. 

 

Machine Embroidered Felt Vase Wraps

The felt I wrote about last time was cut from a much bigger piece.  I had originally been planning to make a large wall hanging but felt a sudden desire to take the scisssors to it and have a play.  I decided to stitch another, bigger piece of the felt so that I could make a couple of vase wraps.  I thought the texture of the felt would be seen better in a 3D item rather than on the wall in this case.  It took hours to stitch but it was very absorbing so I didn't really notice the time until after it was done!

 
I made a large vase (45cm) and a smaller one to compliment (30cm):

They have been delivered to Coastal Creatives Gallery, waiting to find a new home ! 

Experimental Felt & Parisian Flowers

Have recently been playing with my favourite thing about feltmaking - the different textures you can make with inclusions and stitching.  The only limit is your imagination - oh, and time.  I lost about 2 hours stitching into this piece and it felt like five minutes!

 

 

Have also been to Paris recently where I did my usual thing of not taking photos of popular tourist attractions but seemed to focus more on local arts, the birds, iron railings and flowers! Why is that I wonder?  I think I just like details.

Found this gorgeous quilt in a shop in The Marais - simple design but stunning!  And so much work by hand.

And there were so many flowers all over Paris.   Couldn't resist photographing all the colours for future inspirations!

More Felt Panels....

Hello.  I've completed three felt flower panels now, the first one is pictured here. The other two are pictured below.  They are approx 140cm x 45cm and are backed with calico and hanging rods so they are left free to be touched rather than framed behind glass.

I used hand and machine embroidery to pick out some details and give a bit of texture.

 

Have got lots more panels planned - just need to get them out of my head and into felt and stitch!

Making Felt Panels

 

We went to Lyme Regis recently for some much needed rest (and cream teas and fudge and ice creams!).  We took 100s of photos while we were there so have got lots more ideas to work through in felt.  Mum made some more pebbles which have proved really popular.  They are very tactile and have to be picked up and played with!  Although by design they are supposed to be paperweights, doorstops or decorations.

 

I was obsessed with taking photos of boats as I really want to depict them in wall art, and especially the fishing boats (they looked so cute!):

  

We also took loads of photos of flowers which inspired a few of the felt wall panels we have made since we got back:

 

 

Flowers panel (approx 140cm x 45cm)

 

Time flies!

Hi...Can't believe it's been over two months since we wrote!

Have been really busy with work commitments (officey work, not fun fibre work!) and other things, so all of a sudden it's June and we haven't been playing with fibres nearly as much as we'd have liked.  Anyway, hopefully will have more time now and have just recently unburied some woolly, fibrey treasures and dusted off the sewing machine to make a start on some more felt pieces.

Mum has been trying out a carding machine we bought a while back and I think she is finding it somewhat addictive!  Below are some photos of felt pictures she carded some wool for and then did some really beautiful decorative stitching on.  I haven't got photos of the whole things just some details.

 

 

I decided to get some old bits and pieces out of my samples box (where I throw odds and ends of felt scraps and experiments) to get a few ideas and start thinking about some future projects, here they are laid on the desk...

 

I got all inspired and decided to make a large panel with the greens and pinks and somehow have ended up with blues and yellows.  I haven't got a photo of the new work in progress, as the light has gone for today.  But it just shows that it doesn't matter if I make a plan, as soon as I look in the boxes of colours I am lost to grabbing whatever takes my eye!

I have also been doing a bit of experimenting.  The other day I decided to rework a piece of felt I made a little while ago.  Normally I leave the edges of felt to be natural but I decided to cut this piece up and "finish" the edges.  I rather like the wavy edges and think I will definitely be playing more with this idea!

 

Felt & Machine Embroidery Artwork - Beach Huts

Just thought we'd share some photos of a commission piece of artwork we've just finished.  It's very similar in style to the previous beach huts pictures we've created but this time it was a lot bigger at 4 feet long!  Really enjoyed making this one and would love to do more!  Here is a picture of the finished thing and also of some detail:

 

 

We have just been to Cornwall for a long weekend and have come back with a camera full of inspirational photos so hopefully will find some time to turn some of them into new felt artwork.  Too many ideas, not enough hours!