Continuing with the “Wearable Art” theme, another project I was working on during lockdown was making wet felted cuffs. You can read all about it over on the Felt & Fibre Studio….. https://feltingandfiberstudio.com/2020/08/08/cuffs-and-stuff/
One of my favourite pastimes has to be creating wet felted jewellery. I love the sculptural aspect of felting and when this is combined with small wearable items like necklaces and bangles, each one becomes a miniature piece of sculptural, wearable art.
These pieces were created early on during the lockdown when I came to realise that I was never happier than when I was working with lots of texture and a very simple monotone colour palette. In truth I’ve always known this but somehow it’s been amplified with spending much more time in the studio and noticing that the more colourful work was jarring with me!
The Superfine Merino necklaces are embellished with stitch, beading and tiny pieces of Nuno and finished with metal chain fasteners. The great thing about this technique is that each piece is totally unique, you could never have two pieces alike.
They say the longer you put something off the harder it becomes. Well I definitely find that’s the case when it comes to blogging! I’m not a natural “writer” but even so I can’t believe it’s been more than six months since my last post! Note to self….must try harder!!
Back in April I created two pieces of abstract wall art for the bi-annual Waltham Textiles Exhibition. It should have been happening later this month but, as with so many events, will now be taking place in 2021, fingers crossed!!
This first piece will be mounted onto board measuring 50cm x 100cm. Inspired by sunsets it consists of various wet felted fibres, Viscose fibres and a mix of natural and synthetic fabrics. It’s all held in place using machine free motion stitching onto a painted Lutradur background. I love the textures that can be achieved when using this technique and I particularly like adding synthetic glitzy fabrics for a little bit of bling!
This second piece was constructed in the same way. Rather than mounting it on a board, I think I’m going to mount this one behind glass in a black edged 40cm x 80cm frame.
Last year I joined a group of creative ladies who meet once a month at Waltham Windmill. As well as working on our own projects we have a number of set “challenges” requiring us to work to a certain theme. This week I began one those challenges which is to produces three A4 size pieces of work using just three colours. Each piece is to have one predominant colour, plus a small amount of the other two. The format can be landscape or portrait but all three will be displayed together. The design, techniques and materials are entirely up to the individual.
I just love it when I hear someone has been inspired to have a go at a technique themselves! Lea’s work is wonderful and it’s well worth taking a look at her other projects.
I saw a blog post by Karen Lane of a nuno felted collar workshop she ran for the Belchford Felting Group using the “tile” technique and thought I would try my hand at it.
I then convered the framed piece with two fine layers of merino roving. Added some commerical felt flowers in one corner for embellishment and then covered the roving with a layer of navy Margilan silk gauze. After felting, fulling and leaving to dry, here is the finished piece …
I’ve currently got a thing for pebbles so thought it would be nice to create a Pebble Necklace. This has been wet Felted using grey and lichen superfine Merino and white Silk. It features hand stitched Colonial knots and is finished with a bronze coloured metal chain and fastener.
This Rock Pool with Seaweed is approximately 33cm x 38cm. It has been made using Bergschaf fibres for the background and rocks, Merino for the seaweed and Angelina for the water. The barnacles are hand embroidered Colonial Knots.
Rock Pool with Seaweed
This is my latest commissioned piece entitled Towards the Wolds. It’s based on one of my favourite views looking east down Shearmans Wath, towards West Ashby and the rolling hills of the Lincolnshire Wolds.
Shearman’s Wath is the site of a late Neolithic Henge. According to Historic England…..”the buried remains are situated 330m north of Thimbleby Mill on the glacial sands and gravels of the flood plain edge, some 150m east of the River Bain. The monument, which has been reduced by ploughing, can no longer be seen on the ground. It is, however, clearly visible from the air, and has been recorded on aerial photographs since 1970.”
The Wallhanging is approximately 42cm x 64 cm, created from 23 micron Merino fibres, Wet Felted, and embellished with hand and machine stitch. I’ve enjoyed working on this piece and very much looking forward to seeing it hanging in it’s new home!
I slept like a baby last night having got home after three very busy, and very enjoyable, days at the Quilters Guild AGM. The event was held on the Jubilee Campus at Nottingham University and attended by approximately 450 enthusiastic quilters. Over the three days participants had the choice to be entertained, and educated, by hour long lectures, half hour mini workshops and demonstrations, half day workshops and full day workshops. There were several traders, a wonderful selection of second hand books at massively discounted prices, a raffle, tombola and exhibitions.
On the Friday morning I gave an illustrated talk entitled “My F-Plan Diet……Fabric, Fibre & Felting” all about how I was introduced to Textile Art and Feltmaking back in 2014 and how my work has progressed, up to present day. I featured a number of pieces to look at in detail, explaining the background to the design process and the materials used.
In the afternoon The Guild held what they call the “Carousel”. This involved four tutors, each in a separate part of the room, demonstrating a particular technique. I called my sessions The Half Hour Flower and at the end of each half hour period and bell was rung and the participants swapped to a different tutor…..it was like speed dating for crafters!
With this being a “quilters” event, and with all the other guest tutors being textile artists, I felt privileged that the organisers had invited me specifically to teach and promote Feltmaking. On Saturday I had a class of 14 students making wet felted “Landscape” themed pictures, several were trying out wet felting for the very first time. The ladies each brought an image they wanted to create and we began by looking at how they could interpret the various shapes and textures in their design using fibre. Some students incorporated prefelts and everyone had time to do a little needle felting if they chose to, to begin to add the finer detail. The variety and quality of work produced in such a short time was amazing! Being quilters I think everyone was intending to add free motion stitch or hand stitching to their work once they got it home so I’m really hoping I get sent some images of the finished work.
Fantastic work all round from Saturday’s class!
On Sunday I had a class of six ladies making Wet Felted Bowls. We began by discussing the different fibre layouts that can be used to affect the shape and structure of 3D objects as well as how we can create interesting shapes using prefelts and differential shrinkage. The ladies each chose a style they wanted to create from my examples shown below and, as you will see, the results were terrific!
It was a great weekend and I got to meet, chat and work with some lovely ladies. I would just like to thank all my students for being so enthusiastic and working so hard! Thanks also to the Region 10 Committee for inviting me to be a part of it and hope to work with you again in the future.
Yesterday I travelled over to Manchester’s EventCity with fellow Jeudis member Christine Plummer for a day of stewarding at the Creative Craft Show.
We were there as members of the mixed media textile group Jeudis, to promote our group and our most recent body of work on the theme of Abstraction. The work is very varied and include 2D and 3D pieces, wet felting, quilting, collage, hand stitching, machine stitching, etc, etc. My main piece was inspired by rockpools and made with wet felted Bergschaf fibres, found shells and pebbles, hand and machine embellished.
Rockpool on display at EventCity, Manchester
I took this theme further, making several items of felted jewellery for the sales table, and was delighted with the response these brought. The rock pool bracelets were particularly popular and the grey necklet found a new home with a lady who looked absolutely stunning in it!
Rockpool Brooches
Rockpool brooches made from Bergschaf fibres
Rockpool inspired Necklet
The following photos show more of the groups work…..
…..by Gill Green
Close up detail of Gill Greens bowl
…..by Jean Baker
…..by Sue Lewis
…..by Cathy Ball
…..by Linda Settle
…..by Elaine Winterton & Sue Lewis
…..by Christine Plummer
…..by Hazel Brewer
Our next Exhibition will be at Birmingham NEC and I will confirm dates nearer the time.
Lincs In Stitches 