Thursday 14 March 2013

Threads and Yarns

Around this time last year I was still doing the Take A Stitch Tuesday challenge. I struggled with it, and didn't always enjoy it, but I did like what I produced when I used some felt offcuts from a piece I'd made with natural wools for placemats and coasters. I used my own handspun thread to sew the stitches. This is one I made using chain stitch, and this is one using cretan stitch. I hadn't used my threads in a while, but recently I've been inspired by my flickr-friend, Marchi Wierson, a sculptural fibre artist who uses a variety of techniques in her work, such as wet felting and crochet, and loves working with natural wools and fibres. Her recent vessel commission and some gorgeous natural fibre yarns had me rummaging through my wools and fibres and getting my spindles out to spin more thread and yarn. I decided to use three shades of Shetland Wool.


I pulled off some of the tops from each shade:


Then I looked through my embellishment fibres for some I thought would make a nice match. I chose Soybean top, viscose top and flax.


I added some of each fibre to the Shetland tops:


Then I blended them by hand:


I got a couple of my spindles out, this is one I made and painted a few years ago:


I made a small amount of thread, though even a small amount of wool and fibres goes a long way when spinning thread. This is it wound around the spindle.


Then I blended up some more Shetland and fibres and spun a thicker yarn. I will probably use the yarn in a wet felting project, though I have used them for needlefelting before.


Do have a look at Marchi's photostream if you have time, her work is amazing and inspiring :)

4 comments:

  1. The yarn turned out lovely Zed, mmmm i wonder what sort of wet felting project your going to use them for :)

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  2. Hello,

    Thanks for your comment on my blog - did you know you're a no-reply blogger? I had to click on your profile which took me to a wordpress site first... I can help you fix it if you like, email me back!

    I was going to say the Followers button is still working, but only if the blog has installed it, I have one on my blog, but I don't know what will happen when Google Reader goes...

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  3. I love Shetland! The blended fibres with the extra bits look lovely and made a really pretty yarn. Look forward to seeing what you do with it :)
    x

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  4. Thanks Kaz and Deborah :)
    I think I'm going to build up a 'collection' before I use any of it.

    Wendy, I forgot I wasn't signed in for blogger when I commented, just Wordpress. I went back to your blog and clicked 'join this site' above your members and it was similar to the old 'follow' button.
    Thanks for the offer of help :)

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