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The Dodo Blog

Enrollment For The Masterclass Starts Tomorrow

May 14, 2021

Just wanted to let you know you can enroll for the Wet Felted Hats Masterclass from May 15th to May 19th.

The course will start May 22nd and will have a duration of 8 weeks.

If you've been wanting to improve your hat felting skills, stay tuned for the details tomorrow :)

Talk soon!

Vanda

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Wet Felted Hats Masterclass – Enrollment Starting In A Few Days

May 12, 2021
 

As you might know, I created a new course recently: the Wet Felted Hats Masterclass for all of you who’d like to refine your hat making skills.

There was a first edition in February/March, which I launched as a test course. I had built a base structure and invited people to join as Founding Members to help me fully develop the best class possible. So, it grew considerably, since I added new modules, videos and other resources. And now it’s ready for the second edition.

The enrollment will start in a few days, so I wanted to let you know what the Masterclass now looks like.

Ā 

This next edition will include a total of 9 modules, walking you through:

  • How to draw your own patterns with the right size
  • How to modify the base patterns to create new hat shapes
  • How to felt ANY hat WITHOUT a hat block
  • How to felt a hat WITH a hat block
  • How to create the perfect brim
  • How to lay the wool so that you don't have to cut the brim
  • How to embellish the hat surface with nuno felt
  • How to cre
  • ...
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How Do You Know If You’ve Felted Enough?

Mar 18, 2021
 

I often get questions about felting in the comment section of my YouTube channel. Yesterday, one came up that I thought deserved a longer answer. Since it’s a frequently asked question, it made sense to me to write a blog post on the topic.

Here’s what Kathleen McKinney wanted to know: ā€œHow do you know if you’ve felted and fulled enough? How do you know when an item is finished?ā€

As it’s often the case in wet felting, I have to start by saying that it depends on what you’re making.

The general answer would be ā€œdo the pinch testā€. If you pinch the surface of your felt and the fibers don’t lift any more, that means your felt is ready (see video).

Ā 

But there’s more to it than that, so let’s go into more details for different items:

  • Felted ball – If you’re felting a ball, I recommend you do the ā€œbounce testā€ to make sure it’s ready. More on that in this blog post.
  • Pre-felt – If you’re making a pre-felt, you don’t want it to be completely felted, because you might want to have it
  • ...
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The Felted Hats Masterclass Has Grown

Mar 12, 2021

After nearly 4 weeks of the Wet Felted Hats Masterclass, the course has grown considerably.

I’ve been creating short online felting courses since 2016 but planning a masterclass with the goal to cover all the possible challenges you might have when felting a classic hat, drawing patterns with the right measures, and expanding beyond the hats in the course is an entirely different story.

In short, I had never done anything this big. So, I knew it would be a challenge for me. But I love challenges…

This is also the reason it made sense to make it a sort of a ā€œtrialā€ edition: the members invest considerably less than they would in the regular edition, and they get to help me finish building the course. And they know they had a big role to play in the final product.

I have to admit I felt a bit nervous at first. I’m a perfectionist, so I don’t feel comfortable delivering an ā€œunfinishedā€ product. But I’m so happy I decided to do things this way. I would never have been able to know all ...

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Is rolling necessary for nuno felting?

Oct 16, 2020
 

Hi!

Today I’m here with the Q&A Sessions, something I haven’t done for quite some time.

This is where I go through all sorts of questions you have about wet felting.

So, if you have something on your mind that you haven’t been able to solve yet, drop me a line and tell me all about it.

For that, just scroll down to the end of any page on this site. Then click on ā€œContactā€ and let me know what’s troubling you. Your question might be selected for the next Q&A video!

Ok, so today I have a question from Audrey, who writes:

Ā 

ā€œI’ve a question for you and it’s about rolling and nuno felting. Is it really necessary to roll while fulling?

I really like the contact with my piece and am quite happy to spend more time massaging away, particularly when I do not have wool covering all the fabric.

I can understand rolling being preferable for a more layered piece, or larger piece to give a more even result. Ā 

Would love to hear your thoughts whenever you have a moment.Ā 

Many thanks again!...

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12 Tips For Nuno Felting – How To Hold Synthetic Decor With Nuno Felt

Jul 04, 2020
 

There are thousands of ways you can decorate a wet felted project. Some just involve wool, others can include silk or other fabrics, as you know. This is then called Nuno felting. But today I bring you a sample that contains wool, silk and something else.

I wanted to show you an example of how you can use a transparent piece of silk to hold any type of synthetic material, that wouldn’t otherwise attach to wool. In this case, I’ll be using a pre-felt and a piece of white silk chiffon with the same size as the pre-felt. Alternatively, you can lay merino wool tops or batts, and use light gauze instead of silk.

TIP # 1 – USE LIGHT GAUZE INSTEAD OF SILK TO MAKE YOUR EXPERIMENTS CHEAPER

I’m also using circles of a synthetic golden fabric (that doesn’t attach to wool), but you can choose countless other materials like small beads or sequins, for example.

If you’re making a sample, please remember to measure the size of the wool now and after shrinkage.

TIP # 2 – ALWAYS MEASURE YOUR SAM...

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10 Ideas For Nuno Felting Exercises

Sep 27, 2017

Last week I did a short introduction to nuno felting, on how to choose the right materials and a couple of other tips to help you start experimenting with the technique.

Today, I’d like to show you some examples of samples I made before I decided to felt a bigger piece, what materials I chose for them and what went right/wrong.

I’d like to start with the samples where the wool covered the whole fabric surface, just because I find it an easier way to start than just applying stripes, dots or any kind of other motives on the fabric, since the smaller the area that the wool covers, the more difficult it is to make it attach properly to the woven surface.

Sample 1 – This is probably the easiest of them all to get good results. I used an extra-fine green merino and a white cheese cloth for this. Since this type of cloth has a very open weave, the fine merino fibers have no problem attaching to it. I find it produces a very interesting surface, that could look great on a piece of clothing...

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My Tips To Get It Right With Nuno Felting

Sep 20, 2017

I often get questions about nuno felting, so I’d like to share a couple of tips to help you start experimenting, and to get the feeling for it, especially if it’s something entirely new for you.

Nuno felting is a very recent felting method, and it was developed when designers rediscovered felting, and started playing with new ways to use this old textile technique. It was developed by Polly Stirling in the 90s, when she combined the traditional wet felting with light fabrics, like silk for example. In her own words:

ā€˜In 1990 I became entranced by the myriad of transformations of the rich and ancient textile called felt. I spent most of the ensuing decade seeing what new forms could evolve, as appropriate for the subtropics of Australia where I had lived for nearly 20 years. The techniques I developed for making lightweight felts soon led to experiments combining other materials, and in 1994 my assistant Sachiko Kotaka and I developed the technique we termed ā€œNuno Felt.ā€ [From the J...

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A Bag With Nuno Felt - The NEW LAMINATION Technique

Dec 08, 2016
 

Hi!

Today I’ve got something really specialĀ for you.

I’ve been talking about it for a while, but, for some strange reason, it’s a project that took me a long time to finish. Anyway, now it’s ready and available on etsy, and it’s a new video workshop.

But it has a particular meaning to me, because I’ve come up with a NEW TECHNIQUE that solved a problem I had, so it can solve a problem you probably have too.

I’ve combined a couple of techniques that make it possible to attach a difficult fabric onto the wool, when you can’t get it to attach with the normal nuno felting technique. If you’ve ever felted with difficult fabrics, you know what I’m talking about.

So, as you can see, it’s not ā€˜just another workshop’. Check out the video below and tell me what you think! šŸ™‚

If you’re living or travelling to Lisbon in the next couple of months (I hope so, because Lisbon is a very cool city, and you’d have loads of fun!), I’d like to let you know that I’ve updated my workshop calendar. There’...

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Something New Coming Up!

Nov 10, 2016

Hey there šŸ™‚

Depending on how much you’ve experimented with wet felting, you might have already tried mixing fabrics with wool. If that’s the case, you know not all types of fabric work well for nuno felting.

A couple of months ago I came across a fabric I really liked, but I knew it wouldn’t be easy to apply it on wool. I still decided to buy it and went on experimenting, until I found a way to get it to stick!

Of course, I was really excited about it, so I’m preparing a video workshop to show you how I did it. And I hope to have it ready really soon.

In the meantime, I’d like to invite you to check out the video workshops and PDFs I’ve created for you at my etsy shop.

Did you find something you’d like to learn? I’ve created a cupon code for my newsletter subscribers. If you’re not part of the club yet, join until de 24th of November and get the code for a 20% discount on any product in my shop.

Talk to you soon!

P.S.: Do you have any questions on felting? Is there anything I ca...

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