Felt is a versatile textile to use and lends itself to a variety of sewing and needlework projects. Commercially prepared felt is readily available, however this is nothing like the deep, rich textured fabric that comes from handmade felt. Handmade felt is created from pure wool, perhaps with the addition of other fibers and fabrics to give surface texture and additional interest.
Handmade felt is extremely versatile. When fabric is softly felted it makes lovely scarves, hats and light weight items, and when the fabric is hard felted (ie the fibers are felted to their maximum) the fabric is water resistant, making it suitable for for clothing including outwear, slippers and bags. Pieces of felt can be incorporated into projects, for instance panels included in a quilt, as some unusual applique or as a background for embroidery. It is very easy to make your own handmade felt, and there is currently a growing interest in the craft.
Interweave Felt Magazine
A new special edition Felt magazine has recently been published by Interweave Press, which celebrates all things felt related. Felt also covers the three main ways of making felt – that is by felting and fulling knitted fabric, by wet felting loose wool fibers and needlefelting.
Projects
Felt magazine is the only magazine that is dedicated to the craft of felt making, and contains 18 projects as well as instructions explaining the three main techniques. Over half the projects are for felting knitted items, which means that this section will be of limited interest to non-knitters, however it does provide plenty of inspiration and explain the process.
3 of the projects use the wet felting technique, however these three projects really only scratch the surface of wet felting, and don’t explore the technique in depth. Instructions are given explaining how to wet felt fibers, so the reader could easily pick up and develop this themselves. Wet felting can make large impressive sheets of fabric which can be used in many projects.
The rest of the projects use needlefelting. This is the technique of using a barbed needle to poke the wool fibers through each other, and perhaps a base fabric, to mat and join them together.
Technique
Descriptions of technique, along with hints and tips, feature throughout Felt magazine. There are also handy articles looking at the shrinking properties of different fibers, along with illustrated examples
A useful section in the magazine is for recycled felt, and this is ideas for projects which can be completed using items which have been felted ‘inadvertently’ ie a wool jumper which slipped into a hot machine wash by mistake.
Inspiration
There are plenty of photographs, images and illustrations in the magazine. These will inspire readers to have a go. Some of the photographs that accompany adverts are equally inspiring!
On balance Felt magazine is a welcome addition, and it would be great to see this become a regular publication. It is useful to any sewers and needecrafters with an interest in felt, and with a cover price of $7.99 contains plenty of useful information to give value.
Take a look at the Sewing and Needlework section at Suite101 for more interesting reading.
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