Friday 25 July 2008

She is an inspiration to us all.

SARAH LECHNER

She is the artist who inspires me most in my felt work. I have learnt so much from reading her blog and looking at the wonderful items she creates. She has so much enthusiasm and imagination and shares it with us all. Recently she has started selling her methods in the form of tutorials and patterns, which she sells on Etsy. These patterns are copyrighted and you are not able to sell them or the work you produce from them, but for a very small amount of money you are able to learn the techniques which she uses in her work.
Thank you Sarah.

Below you will see photo's of the work I have created from her 2nd tutorial 'Through the window'

As I don't have an embellisher machine, I wet felted, but am very pleased with the results. I was able to use techniques which I didn't know existed and spent many happy hours embroidering, something I haven't done for many years. All I have to do now is to attach it to a cushion cover and it will take pride of place on my new sofa.

Sarah is Swedish and runs two blogs:

Please check them out, you will not be disappointed.

THE FABRIC OF MEDITATION.

and her new blog

THE REVISITED STASH

a recycling blog very close to my heart.




My completed embroidered felt work ready for insertion into the centre of a cushion.




Thursday 3 July 2008

WET FELTING WITH ADDITIONS -TUTORIAL 1b.


My completed work with needle felting and embroidery added.

Follow the instructions below for each stage of the completed tutorial clicking on each image to get a larger view..

Stage 1:- Needle felting the stones at the bottom of the picture.

Using a variety of darker wools, needle felt the stones. I made three large ones leaving a small space in between each, so that I could add tiny needle felted balls. I then added a lighter green wool on the stones for moss, needle felting strands upwards for small tufts of leaves.



Stage 2:- The addition of the white bell flowers and stems, bottom left:-

Make a small piece of thin white wet felting. It must be thin otherwise it will be to bulky. Cut out small semicircular shapes and roll around into a bell shape. You will have to experiment with this first to get the correct shape. I made a paper pattern first. Join the two pieces together with white embroidery thread starting at the top inside and embroider along the seam with three stamens in a fan shape. I made seven of these to add on.
When these are completed, position on your piece and attach with button hole stitch along the top.
Using light green embroidery silk, bring your needle up at the top of the bell flower and down again where you want the stem to end, allowing for the curvature of the stem where it comes away from the flower. With a different thinner,lighter green thread couch the stem thread down.

Stage 3:- Enhancing the velvet flowers.

Because the wire stems had to be taken out of the flowers, you will notice that there is a central hole in each one. Needle felt in this hole and where you think necessary use embroidery to divide the petals.

Stage 4:- Embroidered flowers on the stones.

For the yellow embroidered flowers make petals using a chain stitch, securing each side of the petal with a slip stitch. Fill in each petal with a French knot.

Stage 5:- Embellishing the stamens that were added in the wet felting process.

If necessary needle felt the ends of the stamens making sure that you take the wool over the stamen end.
My stamens originally had lovely red tips, but during the felting process the dye came out which is the reason for the needle felting addition.



Stage 6:- Adding the butterfly.

Make a small piece of wet felt using different colours on each side. It needs to be a thick felt. When the felt is dry, draw a pattern of a butterfly and cut away the body leaving just the wings. Draw around each wing on the felt using a ball point pen and carefully cut out. As the felt is thick you will be able to shave away (with scissors) some of the felt from the inside wings where they attach to the body. This will make them stand out when attached showing the underneath colour.

Decide where you would like the butterfly to be positioned and needle felt the butterfly wings onto your piece, leaving a space between them for the body. Only needle felt along the inner edges of the wings and you will see them raise up from the background work. Now you can fill in the gap between the wings with needle felting in the shape of the butterflies body. Using embroidery threads, embroider the two antennae using a long stitch finishing with a French knot.

Stage 7:- Completion and hanging.

You can either frame your work or hang it as it is. I like the finished shape of the felt so I am going to mount it on a board and attach a hanger.

I am so pleased with what started off to be an experiment that I have decided to give it as a present to my son's partner, I am sure she will love it.

Please try out this tutorial and if you are happy with it leave a comment. If you think I've missed anything out or need to include more detail then I will alter it, so that we can all learn from this.

Good Luck

WET FELTING WITH ADDITIONS -TUTORIAL 1a.

Click on the image to enlarge

I've been experimenting again, but then this is how we learn.
I wanted to enclose some vintage velvet flowers into a piece of wet felting but wasn't sure if and how they would felt, so I took the bull by the horns, so to speak and just got on with it. I thought perhaps I could embroider on top of the felt to give a different dimension so I knew that the felt had to be pretty thin to do this.

Step 1: - Place two thin layers of white merino wool tops and then a thicker layer of variegated yellow green moving into a light brown wool on top. I used wool that had been hand dyed.

Step 2: - Sprinkle dried lavender over the wool to add texture and perfume.

Step 3:- Lay old real silk embroidery threads in place for stems.

Step 4:- Take the central wires from old vintage velvet flower heads. Flatten the flower heads and place at the top of the stems.

Step 5:- Vintage flower stamens can be added to give added floral displays.

Step 6:- Add dried leaves, I got mine from some old pot pourri.

Step 7:- Cover with wispy strands of wool over all the flowers etc, so that they will hold in place.

Step 8:- Cover with net curtaining and wet felt as normal being careful not to move the additions around or scratch your hands on the leaves.

NB That the addition of soapy water isn't added until the design is finished, thus ensuring that the additions of lavender have sunk into the wool and that everything else has a light flimsy covering.

If you have never wet felted before see the brilliant tutorial by Shelby Cefaratti at:-
http://www.weavespindye.org/html/felting1.html

My next post will be the following stage.