Natural dyeing Archives - Jane Mercer Felt Artist

This week in my studio: Ecoprinting spirals

I have been ecoprinting on felt using logwood with geranium and lupin leaves to create a spiral pattern. This piece is planned to be exhibited at an exhibition by York Textile Artists called In Spiral. The felt contains lots of threads and silk that has been marked with Sumi ink. Using logwood and alchemilla leaves I ecoprinted a spiral on some silk noil. I just love the circular discharges from the cut stems. I am going to stitch on both pieces, but as yet haven't decided how to stitch on my silk piece or even what colour to use. Any ideas? I hope to start stitching soon.

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12/06/2022

art exhibition / Eco Dyeing / eco printing / Natural dyeing / Textile art / Wet felting / Yorkshire

Exciting November Exhibition with York Textile artists

It's been a while since I posted here. What have I been doing? Catching up with friends and family and spending lots of time in Scotland. Plus of course some felting, eco printing, dyeing and stitching. I also applied to and was accepted by York Textile artists. I am delighted to be taking part in their winter exhibition. The exhibition will take place at York Cemetery Chapel on the 13th and 14th of November from 10am to 4pm. Holidays in Scotland So here is the beautiful Sango Sands beach in Scotland. I watched seals from the cliffs above these sands. In Scotland you know the rain will never be far away. And all around beautiful scenery just one example of some inspiring lichens. Work in progress Following the eco printing of a scarf using peony, alchemilla, jack by the hedge and eucalyptus leaves, I have stitched the resultant beautiful iron blanket with…

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27/10/2021

machine stitching / Natural dyeing / No Rules Textile Society / pigments / Stitches

My exciting adventure marking fabric with pigments and sumi ink

Can I use pigments to mark fabrics permanently? I don't know ...... But, a few weeks ago I watched an interview with the textile artist Clare Benn where she talked about moving away from using acrylic paint on her textile art and using pigments for environmental reasons. She used soy milk to attach pigments to the fabric. I also came across soy milk as a binder at a workshop with Jorie Johnson She used soy milk to attach Sumi ink to fabrics and then felted them. Recently I joined the No rules textile society led by Jayne Emmerson. Every month there is a different textile-related prompt to explore. This month was paint and ink. These three stimuli made me curious to investigate what was possible with pigments on fabric. Of course, I had some pigments, I have had them so long I can't even remember when I bought them. So why not…

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19/06/2021

art exhibition / British wool fibres / Felt Workshop / IFA / Natural dyeing / Prefelts / shetland / Textile art / Wet felting / Wool / Yorkshire

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

art exhibition / Framing / Natural dyeing / Textile art / Wet felting / Yorkshire

How I frame felt art perfectly using stretcher bars

I wrote a blog on framing with stretcher bars in 2017, and I am surprised that it is my most read blog post. I am in the middle of framing felt pieces for an exhibition so I thought I would show some more photos of the framing process I use. What are stretcher bars? Stretcher bars are made for artists to stretch their own canvases on prior to painting but I don't think they are intended for textile work. That is not a problem for me. These are the ones I have just bought from Great Art Stretcher bars are made in a huge variety of sizes and they are really quite cheap. The bars to frame this picture which is 68 cm long x 32 cm wide cost £7.18. Plus a bit of postage. Measuring First, measure your felt piece. I normally start right at the beginning and design the piece…

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21/03/2021

fibre / Mordant / Natural dyeing / Wet felting

Why is there a touch of March madness in my life?

March. Spring is in the air. It certainly seemed that way last weekend as I sat in the garden in the sun. Lots and lots of gardening to do as well. The madness started actually a few weeks ago when I was introduced to a free internet course by my husband. The course by Jodie King was about how to use Instagram better as an artist. There were some great tips and lots of great people to interact with. So I started paying a bit more attention to Instagram. I learnt about stories and reels and rewrote my bio. I also started posting more frequently. My daughter and husband are taking part in #the100dayproject challenge so I started watching the posts and wondering why I wasn't taking part ? Then I noticed that it would soon be #MendingMarch on Instagram. Well, I am a bit of a mender trying to do my…

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07/03/2021

Eco Dyeing / eco printing / Fabric / Mordant / Natural dyeing / Textile art

It’s time to organise my white fabric stash

Both natural dyeing and eco printing require white fabric and I have been building a disorganised stash. I bought a lot of old tablecloths from the local charity shop during 2019 and early 2020 and mordanted most of it. I even have a stash inventory from about a year ago. Meaningless really as I have not updated it. I stored my stash in numerous plastic blags and in an old blanket chest I got from my mother. Last year in the first lockdown I sewed scrubs for the local hospital and I volunteered to take all the white sheeting we were given, as it wasn’t suitable for making scrubs. This has added to the significantly to the stash. And of course, I have bought lengths of fabric to supplement the recycled material. I have kept my small quantity of silk fabric separate from the rest, and for now, I am not sorting…

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28/02/2021

Fibres / Natural dyeing / Prefelts / Wet felting

My first experiments testing fine wetfelt samples.

I want to make some fine wet felt samples. I have successfully made two large fine merino and silk wet felted wraps, but I am not sure that they have the optimum felt thickness. This is why I am doing these experiments. I am going to make white samples. As I think about this I am reminded of the first blog I wrote ' White out ' I was just starting on an online felting course and I wanted to record my adventures. I was a novice felter and blogger and I lost my white felt in a sea of soap on my white table. You can read it here I have a grey table now so that problem will not reoccur! My large wraps were made with wool layout densities of 4 and 5 mg/cm2. Beautifully thin but hard to layout and prone to thin spots. My new samples will be…

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21/02/2021

Eco Dyeing / eco printing / Fabric / garments / machine stitching / Natural dyeing / sewing

My challenge: Sewing garments with ecoprinted fabric.

I have sewn garments for years but only made garments with eco-printed fabrics for about a year. Eco printed fabric gives me a new challenge: the width of the fabric. I printed eco-fabric that was 42cm wide. Garments normally use 115cm wide fabric. 42cm was limited by my longest pole and the length of my fish kettle. With my new larger fish kettle this has gone up to about 54cm. I looked for interesting garment patterns that could be accommodated by this restriction. I choose a Marcy Tilton jacket pattern My fabric was an old linen table cloth. I cut out the pattern pieces before printing to get round the width limitations. Then I printed the pieces individually using walnut, rose, silverweed and Cornus leaves, and a tannin blanket. Work in progress. Finished jacket The trouser pattern was made up of narrow pieces. I simply sewed my fabric pieces together to get…

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14/02/2021

madder / Natural dyeing / Wool / Woolfest

Can I extract the true red from madder roots ?

For a number of years, I have grown my own madder from a plant that I bought at woolfest from fiery felts. I have tended the plants carefully and as they matured started to harvest the roots. Here is my madder bed looking a bit weedy in the snow. So far using these madder roots I have only been able to achieve peachy reds which I find a bit frustrating. I thought I’d try again. First I read up about the factors which affect the colour extraction process for madder. I reread "Wild Color" by Jenny Dean along with the pages about madder on the website of the wild colours company. I also checked the history of dyeing with madder in the wonderful book "Natural Dye" by Dominique Cardon. What a lot of options there are. True red was the desired red colour to be obtained from madder…

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07/02/2021