Firstly apologies about any odd spacing in this post, or html type rubbish - blogger is having a mad one and after about 1/2 hour trying to get this look right - I'm giving up and going to cook dinner!
Its been a while.. but continuing the story of my experementation using the tumble drier as a tool to make nuno felting less back breaking..
Its been a while.. but continuing the story of my experementation using the tumble drier as a tool to make nuno felting less back breaking..
My most exciting discovery was how brilliantly it worked nuno felting onto synthetic organza! After the smaller sample piece I jumped right into felting a shawl...
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| Started by carding some lovely batts.. you cant really see it but theres loads of silk and a good sprinkling of firestar twinkling away in this :) |
I laid it out on the floor 'cos it was 3m x 1 m..
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| Piece of plastic sheeting allowed me to add extra bits for the collar and bottom fringe detail (which I cut out part way through) |
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| Plastic wrapped & rolled in an old towel - tied up nice and secure. |
I chucked it in the tumble drier on no-heat for 20 minutes
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| After 20 minutes you can already see the organza starting to pucker. Wrapped & rolled it up & put it in for another tumble |
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| You can see how well the fibres have come through the organza here - worked a treat! This was after 50 to 60 minutes tumbling - which is all it took |
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| Just to make doubly sure that the fibres were evenly through I gently ran a rubber-gloved hand over the organza side (this helps the fibres through) |
Now it was time to get physical :) Heat, vigorous rolling & throwing you name it - I did it. To finish I ran the wool side over my well soaped ridged plastic roller tray - this tightens the felt up nicely.
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| Finished! |
My dear friend & fellow Woolgatherer Brenda found me a torso for displaying shawls on :) Isnt she a treasure?!
So there you go thats my final 'Experimental Felting' post ..... until the next time I get curious
xx
12 comments:
Wonderful. The color is great!! I am amazed at how well the dryer works for this. It might make nuno felting fun! :) All that rolling usually makes me never want to touch the piece again!
This is lovely..and I will look forward to your next "experiment"!!
Thanks Giny & Kelly :)
Kelly, I know what you mean.. this certainly made it a lot more enjoyable!
xx
Deborah--The shawl came out wonderfully! I'd love to see photos of your 'add ons' sometime (the extra bits you used to make the fringe details), and I am totally loving your process photos and 'how to's' lately!! It's so informative and fun!!!!! XXO-
:) Thats about the only bit I didnt take photos of Heather! Once the felt was holding together well I just cut the shapes I wanted from the 'extra' bits I'd added to the layout, added the holes, worked the cut edges and carried on felting the whole piece.
You shall probably get sick of this new process photo addiction of mine lol
xx
Fantastic results Deborah ! Working on such a scale always seemed toooo much like hard work for me... But I'm really tempted to have a go now!
The shawl is wonderful!
And the torso shows it off well.
The tumble dryer thing is brill - does any felter really enjoy hours of rolling to get nuno?
Thanks Gill, Annie & Lyn :)
I have to say discovering this tumble drier technique has certainly made me keener to nuno felt :D Hours and days of rolling aren't MY cup of tea either lol. It still takes a fair old bit of time, just cuts out the monotony (& a LOT of the back breaking hard work)
xx
This is wonderful!
Thank you Katie :)
Dear Deborah, thank you for explaining, I hope you don't mind me one more question? So if I read it right, you first lay out a piece off organza on the floor and put right up there the wool? And left some wholes where ypu don't put some wool?
The plastic part I still don't get right ;)) sorry, ;)) the plastic is on top off the wool? Before you roll it onto a towel? Did I get it right? And now I see that the timble has to be no heat... That is great, that I didn't know, I always use heat ;)) that's proberly why the heat doesn't fitt me ;)) thank you fir explaining again, your so great!
Janine
Hi Janine.. Good to hear from you :)
Sorry I hadn't read the post through before sending the link.. the earlier one I had done about this method will help explain it better I think.. http://feltersjourney.blogspot.co.uk/2011/07/experimental-felting-1.html
Have a peek at this post and if you are unsure shout out and I'll try to help :)
Yep, heat in the tumbler will shrink things up pretty good in no time lol
D xx
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