An old grey bag

At Woolfest in 2013 I bought some Gotland fibre . Beautiful carded batts in soft grey shades. Just perfect for a sturdy bag. Which I made and actually wrote 2 blog's about !!! Well I have to now be honest, this bag was not so good really as it was very thin across the bottom and a bit floppy.

For 18 months it's hung on my studio door handle , looking sad, and has never been allowed outside. So I decided to revamp it . I soaked it for a couple of days , and started re fulling. In a gentle sympathetic way you understand, not throwing it at the floor. Persuading it to shrink where it wanted it too.

I quickly cured the thin bottom , and then further shrunk the whole bag to give a more sturdy felt, it reduced in size by about another 15% . My records are a big thin but overall it has now shrunk about 40% Which I think is still debatable for a hardwearing felt . What do you think ? It has turned from a shopping size bag to a large handbag sized bag .

I decided to fit magnetic fasteners for security and remodeled it with more curves. A slimmer and firmer version all round. I even gave it a shave before it faced the world again.

Here is the new version.

And just for information here is the old one, looking strangely sepia!

 

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A Felt Artist needs a felted handbag !

A number of months ago I set off to make myself a handbag, having felted it I decided I did not like it as it was lopsided. I threw it in a drawer. This week I got it out with the intention of making it again, or something similar anyway, as I thought as a recently self confessed Felt Artist I needed to publicly display my work. Looking at it I decided perhaps I could rescue it. All it needed was some differential shrinking and a bit of love and care, some TLC and maybe it could be revived. With this terrible photograph it makes it look worse than it was!

You can just about see the pins marking about 2 cm that needs to be shrunk away

So I set to work and manged to get the front and the back to be the same size. Stitched it as orginaly intended over the imbedded fabrics and then sewed in all the loose ends . I also made a piping following through from the handles for strength and stability.

I have a phobia about losing my important documents., having once lost my passport , so I added a hand stitched zipped inside pocket. This was not in the orginal plan, but seemed like a good addition to me now.

And here it revived and ready to tested out on my trip to the UK this week.

 

 

 

 

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Final year 1 assignment : Grey skies

After all the testing it was time to make my final year one assignment a handbag.

To recap it had to be a beautiful but also practical for every day use handbag. I intended to incorporate textured silk and stitching and two handles. It will have a smartphone pocket. After so much testing it becomes increasingly difficult to actually did the real thing for me , which is a bit bizarre.

Getting ready to start , fibre for all layers weighed out!

The pocket

Placing the silk

Attaching the silk

All the cutting for the handles and flap

Finished and thinking about stitching.

 

Close up of stitching just before finishing

Final finished bag

 

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Testing

One of the things I think the Artybird city guilds course tries to teach is the important of planning ahead and testing things out This makes good sense, especially with felt as there are no opportunities to frog it, to use the knitting expression, when you don't like and turn it into something else.
The final Assignment of the 1st year of the intermediate course, states make a complex bag , with integral handles, flaps and pockets.

So I am testing ideas for this bag. I want this to be a beautiful , but at the same time a serious and practical bag . No frills and flounces or curls but a bag with clean lines , pockets, that could really be used, that will stand up by its self and with sturdy handles. I also want to incorporate some fabric and some stitching and some piping for effect and stability.
I am inspired by the work of two felters who I think achieve this but with very different results Lisa Klakulak and Atsuko Susaki.

I tried three ways of incorporating both scrim and pongee. I want it to stay put, and potentially have complex shapes. My options are just lying it on the surface , prefelt it , both with and without scrunching with cling film , and what I call in my head the MvB technique , after Miriam van Beek , who introduced me to it. Here it's is also possible to scrunch for added texture.

With these small samples it is possible to test out a lot of things at once , so I have also stitched , with cotton and silk , and at various position relative to the fabric. I tested out options for a piping type effect , where it is obvious to me , piping without any piping as it the last grey sample is the best solution.

So that's the testing done , just a bag design to work out now!

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