As knitters, we probably most often think of felting in the context of felting knitting, but there are a lot of other ways to use felt, as Nikola Davidson and Brookelynn Morris share in their book Feltique: Techniques and Projects for Wet Felting, Needle Felting, Fulling, and Working with Commercial Felt.
The incredibly detailed subtitle gives you a pretty good idea of what to expect from this lovely and interesting book for people who might be ready to move beyond the basics of felting knitting (which, yes, is more appropriately termed fulling).
A Felting Overview
As the title suggests, Feltique is arranged into sections based on the various felting techniques, including:
- working with purchased felt
- wet felting
- needle felting
- fulled felt (that's things like felting knitting, crochet and purchased sweaters)
- mixed methods (projects that use, say, fulling and needle felting)
Each chapter goes through the basic steps and what you need to know and have on hand in order to complete each technique. These instructions aren't incredibly detailed and in some cases (wet felting and needle felting, for example) could use more pictures to really be useful to someone who hasn't used these methods before.
Each roundup of the technique is then followed by a series of patterns -- 7 for commercial felt, 9 for wet felting, 11 for needle felting, 13 for fulling and 6 for mixed techniques -- to allow you to try the methods for yourself.
The Patterns
One complaint I have about the book that could have easily been remedied is the fact that the first pattern you come to is for a person who has advanced techniques in working with felt. It's an adorable, amazing project -- an undersea playset complete with a great white shark, giant squid, narwhal, deep-sea diver and a tiny fish -- but it's pretty sure to intimidate newer felters.
Other patterns in the chapter, including ones for a felted envelope and a couple of different necklaces, might have been a better first project because it literally could be a first project.
In any case, some of my favorite projects in the book include the neva handbag, made from commercial felt in a hobo style; the wet felted wild flower pin and artful vessels (made by felting onto a blown-up balloon); the adorable needle-felted cupcake chompers (too advanced for me) and curly dog, who uses curly roving to great advantage; the knit and felted fortune cookies; a lightly fulled earflap hat; and the True Love Purse, a bag knit, fulled and needle felted with the Chinese symbols for true love.
Bottom Line
In all there are seven projects that use knitting; this is not a book for people who are only interested in felting as it pertains to knitting.
But for people who are interested in all sorts of fiber arts and who might want to expand their definition of what felting and working with felt means, this book provides a good introduction (though the true beginner may crave a bit more instruction) and plenty of patterns to get you started thinking about felt in a different way.
Publication date: May 2009.
