Felting Workshop

I covered a tennis ball with Merino wool fleece.  I layered the fleece in opposite directions, starting with a white colour.

I wrapped more fleece on in layers, first using purple fleece, then a layer of pink.

I added more layers of fleece until the tennis ball was completely covered.  I used colours similar to the coloured lights in my photographs that I've been using in my project.  The layers of coloured fleece blur together into different shades like the lights in my photos.

Then I poured a mixture of warm water and soap onto the fleece.  This is a second, smaller one I made using a small plastic ball.  

I rolled the ball between my hands to make the fleece more compact.  I also rolled the ball on the towel which helped take out the water and also created more friction, helping to felt the fleece further.  When the soap stopped making suds and the fleece was more compact I stopped.  Afterwards, we put the fleece tennis balls into a washing machine to help with the felting process.

We also made flat felt.  I layered pieces of white fleece in opposite directions.  Then I layered pieces of coloured felt on top.  I used similar colours of fleece that I had used before.  I poured some warm water and soap onto the fleece again.  Then we placed the pieces of fleece onto a screen and rolled it up.

We rolled the screen back and forth on a towel to create friction in the fleece to turn it into felt.  We turned the pieces of felt around and rolled it again in a different direction.

Afterwards we put these pieces of felt through the washing machine to finish the felting process.

When we took the tennis balls out of the washing machine they looked like this.  The felting was finished and the colours of the fleece had moved around and mixed together during the process.  

This is the felt I made using the tennis ball.  I then cut open the tennis ball with a blade to show the layers of colours in the felt.

Flat felt and felt sphere shape.