FELTING CLASS IN MAINE

We Watched With Rapt Attention

Oh, She’s Good

Good Job

Nice size purse.

She finished two!

She’ll add the strap at home.

Like a Painter’s Palette

Sort of A Show ‘n Tell.

I even like the “curly-Q” at the bottom:)

Handmade clay beads were added.

This is the “less is more” side.

Last  Sunday was a really great day!  I traveled from New Hampshire to a small town in Maine to take a class in “wet felting” with a very talented teacher, Susan Mills.  http://www.susanmills.net.  Her work is way above and beyond the ordinary…it’s not “cutesy”; nor is it traditional, though the art of wet felting has a long tradition behind it.   I’m including a link to a fascinating video showing Mongolian nomads making felt from the wool of their flocks.  They use felted wool for many things but probably most important is as a weatherproof covering for the yurts that are their homes.  That is also shown in the youtube video.

But I digress…back to my first official felting class.  The drive into Maine was beautiful and so was the weather, which if you live in New England, you know we have been a little scarce on that this summer.  There were eight of us in the class and it was a fun, friendly group of gals.  Several of the students had taken the class before, so they were ahead of the game.  One very talented woman brought a couple of lovely bags she had made in the past.  A photo of one of her bags is included in this blog; it was exceptional.

We had a choice of items to make: a hat, purse, mittens, or vessel.  We all chose to make a felted bag and I came prepared with a bunch of sketches but couldn’t decide on a definite style ’til the last minute. First, of course, came a demonstration of the technique and then it was our turn to apply it.  I won’t bog down in details here…instructions on wet felting are easy enough to find in books or on the internet. 

We only had time to make our patterns and do the felting so we took our creations home to put the finishing touches on.  Since I made my bag and the strap in class, I only had to attach the strap and add a couple of clay embellishments I made.  As you see in the photos, my taste runs along the lines of ethnic or world-fusion art.  African influences show up in my work frequently and this purse is no exception.

I’m intrigued with this medium and am not surprised that I want to plunge right in.  But as my son said, “Sooo, what about your jewelry and other work???”  Ahh, there’s the rub (and that is not a veiled reference to the felting process:)