Monday, October 16, 2017

Felted Bowls

Several talented silly textile artists got together and had a play day at Amy's. We had a great time getting wet and laughing ourselves silly making wool felted bowls.
We had a beautiful sunny day to work in and lots of great fibers to work with.
We worked on plastic cafeteria trays, aluminum or metal cookie trays would work well. Laid out a layer of tulle, any color, then made the outside layers of colorful fibers, added several layers of alternating directions white wool for the base, then more layers of color for the interior. Make 5 or more layers of fiber for strength and thickness.
Wrap the fibers and tulle around the orange, then stuff into the toe of a nylon stocking and knot off the nylon. We also tried limes and grapefruit, the limes work fine, the grapefruit are a little thin skinned, we pulverized one, but if you are gentle, it's ok. The navel oranges were very thick skinned and we could use them twice, try a lemon if you can find one with out a point on the tip.
To wet felt wool, you need three things, HEAT, SOAP AND AGGITATION. Use water from the stove that is just about to simmer and heavy latex gloves, dip the ball in the hot water and add a squirt of cheap dish soap. Careful not to burn yourself. Now rub and agitate the ball, for several minutes, scrubbing, turning and rolling to get all sides. Remove from stocking and peel off the tulle, if the tulle sticks, just pry it away, we had to leave the tulle on one because it was felted in. Keep rubbing hard in soapy hot water until felting is finished and fibers are firm together. I ended up using a plastic basket from the dollar store for a ribbed texture for rubbing, we also tried an old fashioned laundry scrub board.
Now the fun part, removing the orange, if you have a thin spot, choose that as the opening and pry the fibers apart, until the orange can be removed. Or cut a small circle at the place you want the top to be, about 1-2" diameter, then pry apart with force until orange comes free. The 3rd choice is to cut an "X" into the top, flip back the flaps and remove orange, the cut can be like flower petals or any other shape you want it to be.
The top of Amy's bowl has a pulled apart, raw jagged edge.
Clare used a black wool for her interior.
Sorry, I lost track of who made which bowls.
We discussed embellishments to add to the finished bowls, beads, couched yarns, embroidery, sticks and twigs, shells, and other fun stuff. Decorate your bowls any way you like.
Any wool fiber can be used, merino, dyed, mohair, angora, but silk fibers won't felt and need to be placed between layers of wool to hold it in place. Try wool yarns, especially handspun, to layer in the mix, just don't add it at the top, cover with a few wool fibers, cause it wont always felt in, and then you have loose strings. We had lots of fun and want to do it again and again!! I learned this from a blog on Nina-Marie's "Off the Wall Friday" I'm sorry I can't find it again to give credit, let me know the link so I can give credit, Amy.

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