Felting Workshop - King Henry's Walk Garden

So the felting workshop was great today; I taught two sessions in a fantastic community garden in North East London. Here are some of the samples the lovely ladies made; I was very impressed by them all!

Hopefully I will be doing more workshops soon so watch this space!

More

[I made more.

I want to make more and more.

More time please.]

Felt for Me

Something for me; laptop cosy.

Felt Workshop - Islington - November

In conjunction with Fabrications of Broadway Market I will be doing a basic felting workshop on Saturday 12th November 2011, in Islington, London. If you wish to book please contact the King Henry's Walk Garden directly. 

Wearing Wool

I've been thinking about using my stash of wool yarn, and also the new additions from the K&S show. It's the colours and textures that draw me in, the way skeins are twisted and presented as wonderful objects in themselves. It gets me thinking... What if yarn can be a necklace? 

Then I see this little book; and I buy it, and I love it, and I start to make my own.

Using some wonderful wool yarn from the Colinette stall last year and some of that amazing hemp yarn that I bought yesterday from the House of Hemp stall I started my own variations.

Knitting & Stitching Show 2011 - My Hoard

So, this weekend was Ally Pally time again! Here is my hoard....

 Yes, I went a bit crazy, but it's only once a year! And some of these things you just cannot find anywhere else!

in this picture, from the top left: small scraps of silk laps & a roll of hand dyed cheesecloth from Oliver Twists; several  fat quarters of japanese patterned cottons, the owl design is so cute! to the right of that is some little 75p scraps of tie dyed cotton

the spiral dyed roving in this picture is from  The Thread Studio stall,  and the  cloth below that is some shot cotton, space dyed velvet and two skeins of hand dyed cotton embroidery thread all from Stef Francis' stall

At the top of this picture is my wonderful hoard of Oliver Twists cotton threads [I have been waiting all year to go back to their stall for these!], next to them are two beautiful skeins of wool yarn that I am giving to my sister so that she can make me a variation of this wonderful shawl for Christmas. The two small 50g balls of yarn are Shetland Aran. Below that are two skeins of fantastically coloured hemp yarn. Next to them are two bundles of Egyptian Cotton cloth (only £5 for the both) and atop them is a wonderfully moss coloured piece of pre-felt from Sue Pearl.

detail of the Oliver Twists cotton

detail of the hemp yarn from The House of Hemp

detail of the shawl yarn

detail of the 75p cotton scraps

detail of the shot cotton, velvet and threads from Stef Francis

detail of the fat quarters

Now I have this huge hoard to add to my stash of other bits. And wandering around the show has given me some inspiration. I just hope I can fit in time to follow some of the ideas alongside starting my Book Arts MA course.

Cuffs

Hand Felted Gloves

Yesterday I, and a handful of others, had the great fortune to be taught how to felt gloves by Cathy Unwin. In what I can only describe as a long but rewarding process we all started with giant hand templates, painstakingly tender laying out, and even gentler felting where they slowly but surely felted and shrank to fit our hands. 

They took so long to make, and I cannot wait until they are fully dry and I can wear them properly to show them off!

Massam & Merino Test

Just trying to see if Merino pre felt will work on Massam fibres. I really like the integration I've got here. Might try it on a teacosy...

Felted Pot Holder / Heat Pad

Welsh Black Wool; Step by Step: