British wool fibres Archives - Jane Mercer Felt Artist

How exciting to be taking part in my first virtual exhibition

I like to take part in an exhibition, but this is the first time I take part in a virtual exhibition. ReConnect opens today and I am exhibiting two pieces. The exhibition is organised by the International Feltmakers Association, of which I am a member. The exhibition coincides with the AGM of the organisation it was to have been held in France, but along with so many things has become virtual. I am inspired by the title ReConect. It is so very appropriate to so many of us, who have spent much of the last year isolated from friends and family. Isolation wasn't easy but reconnecting is also going to require relearning old ways and will take time and patience. Sculpture My sculpture piece uses Bluefaced Leicester, Masham, Welsh, Grey Shetland and Swaledale wools, all with such beautiful natural colours. I made 15 different elements to represent different people, isolated in small…

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28/03/2021

British wool fibres / Natural dyeing

Should I dye with an aluminium or a brass pan ?

A few weeks ago I was lucky to come across this beautiful brass pan in a charity shop. Of course, I bought it. How could I not? So I now have two aluminium jam pans, one enamel pan, one teflon coated pan and my new brass pan. All either bought second hand or given to me. The question I want to answer is does the pan I use for dyeing make a difference to the final dye colours. Brass I understand from Wikipedia is made from copper and zinc. Copper acts as a mordant as does aluminium. I thought the only way to answer to my question was an experiment. The same dyestuff, the same fibres and the same dye process. Then I can see if the pan material makes a difference. I just happened to have quite a large quantity of hawthorn flowers. So the terms of my experiment could be…

9 Comments

21/05/2017

British wool fibres / Eco Dyeing / Natural dyeing / Wet felting

Time for me to have a radical new natural dye process

When I first started using natural dye material I made all white felt pieces containing other fabrics and fibres and then I dyed the felted textile. I have decided I need to radically change my natural dye process. My original all in one natural dye process My all in one process gives a lovely range of connected shades. Everything has been dyed with the same plant material. Lovely but quite limited. Sadly I have also come to the conclusion that it makes boring pieces. There is not enough light and shade or colour variation to make the pieces exciting. Shame. My other reason to change I inadvertently developed two felting methods. One method for pieces that I planned to be naturally dyed and one for pieces made with pre-dyed materials. The felt method I prefer to use is the one I used with the pre-dyed materials. But I really want…

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08/01/2017

British wool fibres / Eco Dyeing / machine stitching / Natural dyeing / Stitches / Wet felting

Felting ready for dyeing

I have been preparing a couple of felts for dyeing. The inspiration is some rocks. Thinking through a plan in my note-book for the felts and fibres. And laying out ready for felting. The pieces all use Blue faced Leicester fibre. I laid out some dark and some light fibre on the back and felted the pieces. I stopped felting when the pieces where about 20% shrunk , to check them and to add some hand stitching. If you look very closely you can see stitching on the fabrics. After final felting., they were ready for some more hand stitching and some machine stitching. Here the stitching is more visible , with the lovely variation you get , when you combine all the different stitch techniques together. Ready now for the dye bath.

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25/05/2016

British wool fibres / Fibres / Natural dyeing / Wet felting

Felt and dye fibre tests

I have had on my to do list for a long time to test soy, flax and jute. By test I mean , felt them and the dye the felt and see what happens. This week I eventually got round to some testing. I actually tested sisal,linen top, flax, jute yarn , cotton knitted yarn and nettle. I am not sure where the soy fibres have got to in the confusion resulting from my move. One day they will turn up. First I made prefelts with the fibres. Here is a sample cut from each prefelts which have been made with Blue faced Leicester fibres. At this stage the different fibres are quite hard to see , but I hoped that with dyeing they would become more visible. I decided to do my test with onion skins. Simple to do and I love the colour . Sisal and linen , still…

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22/05/2016

Artybird Carnforth / British wool fibres / Wet felting

Memories of Artybird

Over the last weeks I have been doing a lot of sorting out and clearing out the mountains of felting I have accumulated. Some things have headed to the recycling but I have also come across some treasured pieces from my first Artybird felting course. Sunsets featured prominently in my first course and here are my beginners attempts at dyeing with some very tentative sunset stitching. One of the great things about the courses was the design work , but there was felting as well Two different techniques to felt a sunset ! My first experience of natural fibres , using Shetland , which I have really grown to love. Making an embroidered piece, again all hand dyed which if I remember correctly I was told to go back and stitch some more . All these pieces are a wonderful reminder of the journey I embarked upon about 5 years ago. I…

2 Comments

01/11/2015

British wool fibres / Felt Workshop / Wet felting

A Radical Decision

Back in June at a workshop with Jeanette Appleton I made a reasonably large piece of felt inspired by lichen covered rocks. Ever since then I have looked at this piece , thinking what an earth should I do now with you ???? I eventually decided that something about it did not really work and maybe I should just use parts of it! Eventually I made a mask out of brown paper thinking maybe make it into a three part piece. I liked the effect even though it was not choosing my favorite parts with this simple mask. So I thought how about choose three parts , and make them into a large felt piece. The more I thought about this the more I liked it . So a made the radical decision to cut my favorite parts out of this large felt piece and reconstruct it. I faffed around…

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18/10/2015

British wool fibres / Wet felting

Slow stitching

I have a small felt piece made with masham and merino fibres and lots of other fabrics that needs the addition of some stitches. My usual working mode is fast , but in this case I have deliberately gone slow, to add some stitches and then put it to one side , wait a while then look again before adding another stitch. First some simple neutral running stitches Add in some bright green cross stitches Think for a while then add some rust coloured French Knots Is this enough , no ! A final touch is needed of with some delicate bright green stitching. Enough I think . Do you agree?

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06/09/2015

British wool fibres / Wet felting

Masham Merino Mixes

I am trying slowly to use more and more British or at least European fibre in my felt and dyeing work. In pursuit of this aim , I bought some Masham fibre from Adelaide Walker at Woolfest. Creamy white and beautiful brown. Although I have this aim I do have a large stash of coloured merino. I decided to try working with the coloured merino and the natural Masham together. I did not physically mix them , but have used them together to make a number of pieces. The Masham is slightly more coarse than the merino , but they blend together beautifully and I love the mix of natural colors in the Masham with the bright colours of the merino. Here are my finished mixed pieces. and here is a small one, actually made with left overs before stitching. This post has been reissued due to problems with the…

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13/08/2015

British wool fibres / Mordant / Natural dyeing / Wet felting

Boring but ……

Over the last few months I have made quite a number of wet felted small vessels. These vessels have been made out of different white fibers and then dyed. At the time I made them I knew exactly what I had done , but coming back to them a few weeks later and I began to get seriously muddled up . I was no longer sure which was the nettled dyed BFL , or the nettled dyed Polwarth ( Thanks to Teri Berry for these fibers they are great) Time to take control and keep on track before I was totally confused. Better admin was an urgent necessity? So I gave each vessel a reference number and a small label with the critical information. And I started I vessel register on a spreadsheet. This feels a bit like work But I know that the key to being able to reproduce…

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01/08/2015