hearts and thrift

Here are some fabric hearts which I made earlier this year with a beautiful photograph album from 1892. Even though the photographs have all been removed the book retains a sense of history.

Joanne Haywood

Joanne Haywood is exhibiting her beautiful jewellery at an exhibition celebrating the 120th anniversary of the Society of Designer Craftsmen founded by William Morris and Walter Crane in 1888. The show continues at 24 Rivington Street, London EC2 until 18th October.

Feltbug workshop

Bag by Livvy

Pleated pot by Violet

Pleated pot by Becky

The next day we made these.

Ribbons and bows

Felt by Becky

Felt by Violet

Felt by Livvy

Here is the felt, before and after felting. Violet came up with the idea of making bows from the felt fibres.

Feltbug workshop

During the Summer I held a felt-making workshop with 3 friends, Livvy, Becky and Violet. This is a picture of the wool fibres, ready for hot water and soap to make the felt.

June bug

Work in progress for the We Make, London craft fair, less than three weeks to go ...

Handweaver's Studio and Gallery

Handweaver's studio and gallery, 29 Haroldstone Road, London, E17 7AN. This is heaven for anyone interested in fibre arts. They stock spinning and weaving supplies and it is also a great place to buy raw materials for feltmaking. Today I was looking for monochrome fibres and found some lovely carded fibres including Light Grey Suffolk, Shetland Moorit, Masham, lambswool, grey Alpaca, Merino and some semi-spun horse hair. The shop is open Tuesday-Saturday.

Number 9 bus

I was looking for a place to photograph the new necklaces I have been working on as the light is not very good indoors at this time of year. I travel around London on buses all the time and I am particularly fond of the old routemaster bus which is still running between the Royal Albert Hall and Aldwych.

Moorhead & Moorhead

Felt Stool No. 7, 2000 by architects and industrial designers Robert and Granger Moorhead of Moorhead & Moorhead, New York. Also from the Ellen Lupton book, Skin: surface substance and design

Tummy bug collection

I have been working on some new ideas while nursing a poorly small person hence the title for this new series of felt works. I had not done any work for a few weeks and although I have been itching to get started again it was really tough getting back into it - there was a huge amount of resistance but last night ideas started to evolve and grow as if by magic - I like those moments. I am not sure where these new pieces are heading but I have been asked to show my work to a gallery so I think I have that in the back of my mind as I am making these.

Mosaic Monday

Mosaic Monday, originally uploaded by Feltbug.

Here is a selection of beautiful creations by some of my contacts on flickr. Click on the image to go to the page with links to the featured artists.

Emily Jo Gibbs

Silver Birch (detail)

Emily Jo Gibbs

Miho Saeki

Felted wool neckpiece

Miho Saeki

Heather Belcher

pink silk

Heather Belcher is a feltmaker - we both worked in Cable Street Studios in the mid-80s - and I have been looking forward to catching up with her again after 20 years! Heather has always worked with felt and it was good to see her exploring some exciting new ideas with the artwork that she is exhibiting at this event - I look forward to seeing more in the future.

Felt and thrift

Felt and thrifted cafe jar.

I made 2 pleated felt pots for the fair, it was so good to make felt again after a long abstinence! And then we went to the car boot fair on Sunday where I found some lovely stuff including the cafe jar and a length of Timney Fowler b/w fabric from the 80s.

Crochet and felt.

Here I am wearing my crochet bracelets, holding a felt vessel, beautifully composed shot by Jamila Prowse.


My Mum gave me this lovely book from Rowan and I have crocheted 2 bracelets from it. It has some beautiful recipes for knitting and felting, photographed by Kristin Perers at Petersham Nurseries.

Felt pods

Felt pods - a work in progress. I have been busy making felt for the fair on Sunday, but I think these will be for another project later in the year. I have been working on this piece for a year off and on. It keeps changing - its form and function !

Hinge

Felt bags

Small grey felt bag, thrifted from charity shop, I have added one of my felt bugs to it.

Document bag from Habitat, embellished with shibori felt.

The other side of the document bag, embellished with 2 experimental felt pieces.

Grey felt vessel with flowers