Oy Felt!

Nuno Felting

Nuno felting is a fabric felting technique developed by Polly Stirling, a fiber artist from New South Wales, Australia, around 1992. The name is derived from the Japanese word "nuno" meaning cloth. The technique bonds loose fibre, usually wool, into a sheer fabric such as silk gauze, creating a lightweight felt. The fibres can completely cover the background fabric, or they may be used as a decorative design that allows the backing fabric to show. Nuno felting often incorporates several layers of loose fibres combined to build up colour, texture, and/or design elements in the finished fabric. Via Wikipedia

After playing around a bit with wet felting (see the previous post). I thought I'd like to try some Nuno Felting. And it just so happens that my sister has a birthday coming up! I thought she might like a scarf.

I found a couple good websites that had videos to watch with good info and instructions and took copious notes.

Gathered my materials and jumped in. Here are some photos of the process:

Because I will be felting both sides, I needed to mark how big the piece of silk chiffon was. Glad the kitchen countertop was long enough!

Next, made sure my bubblewrap and tule were big enough (they were) then laid down the plastic wrap on top of the bubble wrap so the fibers didn't get down in between the bubbles.

My roving and wool yarn at the ready, putting down the bottom layer.

Bottom layer done, silk scarf on top, starting top layer.

Finished with that step, tulle carefully placed on top. Now time to wet with soapy water.

After entire piece is wet, time to start rolling. Whole thing rolled up and tied. Roll 200 times, unroll, takeoff and put back the tulle, roll up and roll for another 200, and again and again until the fibers start coming thru the silk.

 I got so involved in the process that I failed to take pix of the next step. Unroll piece, gently add some HOT soapy water and rub. The take to the sink, rinse in hot water and hold in hands and let fall into the sink. Rinse, repeat. again and again. Then switch to cold water for the final rinse.

Lay out on a towel to dry. This is both sides.

Here you can see how much is has shrunk and puckered.

And the final result. I hope my sister likes it!

 And there you go! I have another piece of silk... who should I make the next scarf for?