Some felt experiments

Yesterday I spent the afternoon felting with yarns that I bought recently in Scotland (see my previous post). To bind the threads with each other, I used wool top. I first started with laying out vertical treads, added the wool top, then added the horizontal threads to make a grid pattern.
In my first experiment I also added some wool top above this last layer. But this piece did not turn out so well. I wanted a lacelike effect. So I tried again, using 3 layers: yarns, wool top and another layer of yarns. The wooltop was placed with open spaces so that I could have holes in the felt. This second picture - in white- is the result. I really liked it but felt that I needed to get rid of the praphic grid pattern.

So the red version (first picture) was next: just spiling out the yarn over the table, then adding the wool top and of course, adding an extra layer of yarn in loose loops.
This is the piece that I love best. This yarn also felted better with the wool top than the previous one.
I could do some handstitching on the white felt to bind the yarn better with the rest of the felt, but feel that it might ruin the loose and rough look of the feel.
Wishing for an embellisher right now.... Sigh...
Also tried some other things, like felting to organza. It did work, but the piece did not look good enough to post here but is a great piece to do some other techniques on.
Anyway, I enjoyed these experiments even though I am a bit limited in my movements - rolling the felt - because of some stitches in my shoulder (because of minor surgery). Looking forward to removal of these stitches and being able to move my arm freely again!

Yarns for felting

On our last one week holiday (they are always way too short), we discovered this little yarnshop called Woolfish near the nature reserve of St. Abbs Head (South Scotland, east coast).
One corner is filled with beautiful yarns in glorious colours.
I had decided that I would not buy more yarn - since I still have plenty of them - but these yarns were very different, I simply could not resist...


I ended up buying different balls of yarns for felting and thought that I really resisted the urge to buy new yarns for a complete garment.
But back in the car and droving off, I realised that I would never be able to buy these luxuriously yarns in the Netherlands.


So the next day, when the car was packed and we were ready to go to the ferry back to Holland, we stopped again and bought dark blue space dyed yarn for a sweater... So this autumn I do not have to get bored, but get knitting again - and probably by hand as well.

One of the skeins is already partly used in a piece of weaving that I did on a kids loom. I do own a regular loom, but it is in hiding on my mothers attic for more than 11 years now. I do not have enough space here in our house and weaving takes up so much time, especially the part of preparation. Also, once the threads are all tied up, you can't change your mind. And changing my mind is something I always like to do!
Anyway, the kids loom did work well enough and it is going to be felted anyway.
Another ball of yarn has been knitted up, it not only contains wool, but mohair as well. Am very curious how well that will turn out.

The third picture is of another ball of yarn, from Japan. As you can see, the colours are quite contrasting and I am looking forward to felt it. Still have to make up my mind whether I want to knit it up, or cut up threads and felt these together with carded wool.

Here is the website of the shop:
www.woolfish.co.uk

And a blog as well:
http://woolfisher.blogspot.com/

Barcelona, city of Gaudi (part 1)

Winter is definetly not my season! Spring and autumn, early summermornings are the best times of the year for me. Back in September I already foresaw the long grey and dreary winter months of Holland and decided that we needed to break this winter up with a little trip to the south of Europe. It did not matter which country it was, as long as it was south!
I found a cheap flight on the internet - 2 tickets to Girona (near Barcelona) in Spain, two ways for 76 euroos. Just what I needed!

We did some research on the web about the city and bought a city guide and decided that we first wanted to see the works of Antoni Gaudi. Well, although I have seen images of his work before - seeing them in real life was quite another experience.


Spain did live up to its expectations: warm and sunny in February! What a difference with home.
On our first day we went to Park Güel, which is famous for the long winding benches filled with mosaics. We enjoyed the palms, sun and parrots up there. But the part I liked most was the space underneath the court.
Dozens of tall columns supporting the large space (including the benches) above it. With on the outer side, the columns placed a bit out of line, which fooled the eyes and created a strange illusion.
The ceiling was covered in mosaics and so here and there were large discs attached to it with swirly motives - big splashes of colour against the white broken tiles.


The sun was shining and the warm light created a beautiful atmosphere between the columns. Then add some guitar music, the sounds of little colourful parrots to it and the idyl is just perfect. I just wandered around these columns, and lost my sense of direction because I also kept looking up, admiring the ceiling.


The houses that stand next to the gate of the park look almost like houses from a fairy tale. Nothing on it is conventional - when you walk around them you are in for a surprise every time you turn a corner or look up.
Gaudi has been fascinated by the geometry of nature form an early age, and it definitly shows in his work. Also he was one of the first designers that saw architecture as a complete art form, and extended his creativity to all the elements of his work. Not just the walls and roofs, but the windows, doors, chimneys, up to the doorknobs got his attention.

Gaudi worked from 1878 till 1926, but his work is so modern, different, organic and most of all inspiring. It seems like he was years ahead in his approach to not just buildings, but also environments like Park Güel.
And instead of building impressive buildings, he designed them to invite you to come closer and discover the strange and funny details.
So after being in the Park, I could not wait to see 'La Pedrera'...

Textile Pages for True Colours Round Robin

These facric pages went to the UK for the first round of the True Colours Round Robin. This was the first time that I experimented with a thinner transfer of a photo copy.
The shells have been coloured with water colour crayons for some extra colour.


At the other side of the textile pages (to be folded) I tried water soluble Solvy for the first time. This was sewed to the page and some beads were added as well. This was a more abstract interpretation of the theme 'Colours of the sea'.

For the second round I made this square page. Layers of organza with fibers trapped in between the layers. Some sewing with the machine and some experimentation with the soldering iron - something I really need to practise...

Felting in summer

A few weeks ago I went to Nellie de Mulder, an artist here in our village, to felt. Apart from the work that she sells, she also teaches felting classes. (See her website at: http://nelliedemulder.nl )
I tried to make pages for a felted book, and wanted to make simple 'drawings' in the felt. In the picture on top you can see how the wool was laid out on the cotton cloth. The fabric is used as a base for the felting and gives a very textural effect after felting. The picture was taken after the wool was felted a little bit.
On the other side of this 'page' I laid out another pattern. Then 3 different pages were felted by rolling them in bubble plastic and rolling over the table.
The felts were great. I like the rippled effect that the cotton fabric within causes. Just too bad that the pages were way to large for a felted book.

Cutting them up will loose the graphic designs on them. So I will probably end up making new, smaller pages for a felted book!