Wet Felt Picture Making

We are lucky enough in Carlisle Hobbycraft to have some wonderful visiting artisans in who teach different craft classes.  On Friday, Julie Harrison came to do a wet felting class, of course I had to go along and have a play - I had not attempted wet felting before so was interested in how to do it.

She landed carrying an enormous amount of bits and bobs.

After a brief chat about the craft, it was playtime....

This is my attempt in progress...

First of all we got a piece of voile, folded in in half and layered some un-dyed roving wool onto it.

Next some colour - this is sky.

And some grass..... (and a brew)

Then some detail, can you tell what it is yet?  (It's a tree!!)

Leaves and apples  :)

Now it was time to pull the voile over the top and sandwich it all in.

Add some soapy water and push it through the voile to soak into the wool.

After a good vigorous rub, both front and back, I opened it up to find this  :)

Now to felt it down a bit.  We wrapped it round a foam roller, then into a towel and gave it a good few rolls back and forward on the bench  (250 rolls to be precise.)

Voila !  No idea what I am going to do with it, but it was fun to make.... and it helped trim a few millimetres off my bingo wings!

Here is my Mum, Vera, making hers.

Squeezing that water through the wool.

Pretty flowers.

Julie will be running another class soon, keep checking out the Hobbycraft, Carlisle website to find out when.