Stitches Archives - Jane Mercer Felt Artist

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

Armley Mill / machine stitching / Photography / Stitches / Textile art / Wet felting / Yorkshire

Why my love of textile machines is inspiring me.

In a dark mouldy area on the ground floor of Armley mill there are three fulling machines, textile machines, in a room that once housed many. The machines were driven by water and large hammers smashed the wet woven cloth , shrinking it and making it warmer and water resistant. On the more airy first floor of the mill amongst the warping, carding and spinning machines stand two jacquard head textile machines. These complex, intricate machines allowed the automation of the weaving process and were at the very start of the development of computers. Each machine contians hundreds of threads and beautiful cast levers, cogs and wheels. Two totally amazing and totally different textile machines both key to the development of the woollen textile industry. Armley Mill is the industrial museum of Leeds , containing not only textile machines, but a cinema and photography equipment exhibits. Plus lots of artefacts relating to…

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07/01/2018

Stitches / Wet felting

Make the best use of your felting scraps

Felting scraps are overwhelming me. What can I do with them? I have all kinds of felting scraps Partially felted scraps, Scraps of full felt , Scraps of prefelts I am sure all felters are the same. As I move into my new felting studio I tell myself - you must take action on all these boxes of felting scraps. You can only keep the best ones , the most useful ones , the ones were you have very happy memories of the piece or the time that you made them. If those are my criteria I will have to keep all of my felting scraps which is not an acceptable solution. A scan of the Internet shows that felting scraps are a common problem but most of the solutions are sticking and gluing not really what I was looking for. Here is a good example. All a bit twee for me.…

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07/11/2016

fibre / Stitches / Wet felting

Here is my new method to make better FELT

I am rusher, doing everything at high speed. Is this a problem? I walk, read and talk fast and I can wet felt fast. It is a great time saving skill ! So why have I come to the conclusion that when making felt - slower is better. AS a result of this conclusion I am working on a personnel slowness re-education program. I started on my journey at a workshop with Jeanette Appleton. She makes beautiful felt pieces very slowly and thoughtfully and I greatly admire her work. But it is not easy for us naturally born rushers to slow down. Here an example of my slowing down reeducation process in action. I love the vibrant orange silk embedded in this piece of flirty felt : the shadowy hidden depths below and the sea green spirals are like thought patterns. But and its a big but this felt screamed out at…

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30/10/2016

Creative strength training / Eco Dyeing / Stitches

Never to old to learn!

With no space to felt or dye I need some alternative creative outlets. I need to learn something new. Stitching is a good calming task , one that has been recommended to me . I am slowly stitching a piece in orange and greys that's coming on well , very slowly though. I have quite a number of Eco dyed pieces , which I have looked at and wondered what next. That's actually a bit strange for me, because normal I am good at making decisions, in fact I sometimes get caught out by my snap decisions. But I think here I will wait my time until something tells me where to cut or stitch these beauties. I am also knitting, but then I am always knitting . Only one thing on the go at the moment , this beautiful sweater , but in my case in purple. Not the easiest…

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09/10/2016

Knitting and Stitching show / shibori / Stitches / Wet felting

Chaos at home : Now is the time to make stitched felt

Did you ever have a time when you needed to try something new ? Here are my ideas to be creative with stitched felt when my house is chaotic as it occupied by builders The renovation and building work we planned on our house before we moved back to the UK is now well under way. It will be wonderful when it's finished but currently there is total chaos in our house and not much opportunity for wet felting. But there is plenty of time for other things. Last weekend I went to the felting day with the IFA region 10 felters. The challenge for our stand at the knitting and stitching show at Harrogate in November is geometric man made forms. This challenge made me think of the wonderful stitched felt of Chung-Im Kim which I saw in the Netherlands in 2014. Beautiful delicate surface texture , with tiny tiny stitches.…

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14/08/2016

Stitches / Wet felting

The bigger sister.

I slowly and carefully made this felt piece , trying to think about the outcome every step of the way . Well I liked it but it seemed like a part of a piece, not a piece in its own right. So I put it away for a while ........ and when I eventually got it out I thought maybe it needed a sister piece , a big sister piece. Maybe something like this. So eventually I made a sister felt piece using some of the same threads , but no silk. A serious but complimentary piece. Now how should they be connected ? Like this maybe ? Something like that anyway . Here is the final piece , far more of a finished composition I think and I do really like the combination of the flat felt and the felted silk organza. Strangely the sister piece has turned out nearly…

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31/07/2016

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

Prefelts / Stitches / Wet felting

Step by step

Following my resolution to take things more slowly , I have been gradually developing a piece , felting it and then letting it dry before felting some more. This gives more opportunities for adjustments along the way . My starting point , was a collection of prefelts , all covered in silk organza, one piece of which had been stitched. Here is the back , showing the prefelts pinned together , at the back , so the pins can be removed. After the first felting. Looking quite good , apart from end of stitching which needs to to threaded to the back and the edges that need a bit of straightening. A little more felting and thinking about bottom edge. Should it be straight? To add constrast I now removed some parts of the silk. Well I think its felted now , I just have to decide what to do with the…

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17/04/2016

Stitches / Wet felting

Simple straight stitches

I am not a natural hand stitcher, I am more comfortable with a sewing machine. As I prepared to attend a workshop by Jeanette Appleton on stitching and texture in felt I have been reflecting back at where I think my hand stitching has really worked and I feel happy with it. I think I was initially put off stitching by hand by the idea that it had to be complex embroidery. In fact sometimes the simpler the stitching the better. Random straight stitches adding more texture to some felted silk. Using straight stitches to connect elements of a piece together, and to show the contrast between the felt and the felted silk. A bit of glitter. Gold stitching drawing patterns across a piece. Using again just straight stitching combining different colours with running straight stitches in different directions. Following the curve but…

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03/04/2016