Margery muses on how wool yarn when felted
becomes like sculptor's clay . . .

Dear KnitBits® Subscribers,

Felting is freeing. Through felting, a knitted fabric can be transformed into a new material that is wonderful, interesting and, most amazing of all, malleable until finished. Felting is a whole new medium to experiment with creatively. Just as the throwing, forming and firing of ceramic clay creates vessels that are strong and stable, so the felting process of hot water, soap and agitation transforms a knitted woolen fabric into a fixed, dimensional form. Like clay when fired, wool when felted maintains a 3 dimensional structural form without an armature.

Whether you knit in circular and create a seamless vessel or whether you piece together shapes and then felt, one can create rounded forms that become hats, bags, bowls and toys. What you need is a top loading washing machine, hot water and soap. You should first experiment with swatches to see the percentage of shrinkage. You can watch the process and stop it when you feel that you are done. Then take the wet item out of the machine and let it dry flat or around a form, depending upon the desired finished shape. You can stretch the wet fabric and mold it much like clay. Once it has finally dried, it will no longer shrink and it will remain a felted fabric.

Felt is simply matted wool. Wool becomes felted when it is subjected to moisture, heat and pressure. When sheep are unshorn, over time their wool naturally felts or "cots." Hot soapy water makes the wool slippery and causes tiny scales on the fiber to "open up," accelerating the felting process. The craft of papermaking is much like felting. It is a tangling and re-aligning of fibers that makes the felt or paper fixed. Another example of felting is the hip hairstyle, dredlocks. It is actually felted strands of hair that have snarled and snagged, agitating the cuticles and forming a matted "dred."

Felting works best on wool, alpaca and mohair that hasn't been preshrunk or chemically treated to resist shrinking. Fulling is the process of partial felting. You can combine yarns that felt with novelty fancy fibers that don't to achieve fabrics with textural interest and a juxtapostioning of matte and shine.

Perhaps I have arrived to the felting fold a bit late, but it is with unbridled enthusiasm that I can now recommend several of our yarns for your next felting project. Among my favorites are Ultra™Alpaca, Hip-Hop™ and Vibe™. Vibe is available in such vivid colors and it knits up quickly on #15 needles. Be assured that Vibe will maintain a richness of tone even after the rigorous process of washing and agitating in hot, soapy water. Ultra Alpaca and Hip-Hop also felt beautifully and are available in a wide variety of shades for your felting pleasure.

Today we are posting free patterns for 4 felted projects in Ultra Alpaca, Hip-Hop and Vibe.

Trish from cyberspace wrote: "I'm a new knitter, is felting too advanced for me? I understand that you knit an object and then you wash it and it shrinks to another size, sort of like when your husband does the wash. Is there an easy pattern for me to start with?"

Trish, the timing of your question was perfect. Felting is ideal for a new knitter. Knitting mistakes and uneven stitches disappear during the felting process and knitting items for felting is a great way to perfect your knitting and purling skills. For your first foray into felting, I would recommend a project where fit is not an issue, such as our easy Vibe Tote. Whether the tote felts more or less can depend on your washing machine but the final size doesn't make much difference with these carry-all totes.

All the best,

Margery Winter
Creative Director

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