Resources for intermediate felt makers
After experimenting with wet felting for some time, learning the basics and maybe even felting some pieces on a resist, you may feel you’d like your felt to become more professional and well finished. Yet, you may also not know what to do to get to that next level of quality you’d like to achieve.
So, I’ve put together a list of resources for intermediate felt makers, to help you exercise some aspects of your craft and get to that quality you’re dreaming of.
START BY WORKING ON THE QUALITY OF YOUR FLAT FELT
I find working on the quality of your flat felt is sometimes underrated. Felt makers are often excited about moving on to the next challenging technique and forget about the impact of being able to produce an excellent flat felt.
Of course, that’s understandable, since we all want to learn new things. And, still, I’d love to convince you this is one of the most important things you can do to become a better felt maker.
Here are some clues that you should be working on perfecting your flat felt:
- You’re having issues getting an even layout. You get thinner and thicker areas on your felt.
- You’re having issues getting a thin layout.
- You’re having issues getting straight edges. The edges on your felt are irregular or wavy.
If you resonate with any of these problems, I recommend you have a look at these blog posts, and train those aspects of your wet felting:
- How to create straight and neat edges
- Don’t cut your felt
- How to avoid stiff felt
- How to make fine and flexible felt (only with wool)
- How to make fine and flexible felt (with viscose)
- How to make fine and flexible felt (with silk)
- Why you get holes in your thin felt
If you also work with wool batts, and aren’t sure why you get different results, have a look at this experiment:
(Note: There’s lots more about the different layout methods for both wool batts and wool tops here.)
LEARN THE EASY WAY TO MAKE CORDS
Apart from flat felt, cords are another one of the basic shapes for wet felting, that you’ll always find yourself needing for your projects.
Recently, I was very surprised to realize many experienced wet felters have a complicated way of making cords. So, I’d like to leave you with a simple suggestion to get those cords felted without creases or wrinkles, and always get the thickness right:
FELTING BOWLS THAT ARE REALLY ROUND
Bowls are the most frequent 3D shape felters make when they start working with resists. And the most frequent complaint felters have is that they can’t get them to be perfectly round. So, I’ve got you covered. Here are two blog posts that can help you with this:
WHAT ELSE DO YOU NEED TO BE ABLE TO MAKE GOOD QUALITY 3D FELT?
There are a couple of important concepts you need to understand to be able to make good quality 3D felt. Here are some of them:
- Make sure you understand everything concerning shrinkage
- My system to create my resist patterns – Part 1
- My system to create my resist patterns – Part 2
And, if you start having piles of resists and paper templates, and you don’t know what is what, you can check out my system to organize a pattern archive here.
In closing today’s blog post, let me tell you a secret: a big part of my work nowadays is made using pre-felts. Pre-felts are extremely useful and there’s no end to how you can apply them in your wet felting projects. So, mastering how to make them exactly as you want for a particular piece can massively improve your work. Here are some of my best tips on this game changing element:
If you’re an intermediate felt maker, you feel like you’ve reached a plateau and you’d like to learn and grow inside a supporting community with my ongoing help, keep an eye on your inbox.
THE DODO HUB, my signature program, will be opening for registration soon. Meanwhile, you can have a look at what participants are making inside TDH, here and here.
Talk soon!
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