How long does it take to make a felted mixed media art vest?
Fiber by fiber, layer by layer…felting is magic but a very slow design process!
Felt making is a slow design process!
After so many years, I still underestimate how long it takes to shape finest wool fibers into an outstanding piece of (wearable art)!
I even don’t try to guess, how few a person, who never felted, can imagine the work and time that flows into my pieces! When people ask me how much time it takes to make a piece, I always struggle what to say!
From the beginning – the layout of fibers - to the end – finishing up with embroidery and paint - more often than never, 6 to 8 weeks pass by.
The longest time I spent for now on a creation is 7 month. This is the result: art vest PRINCIPESSA
“PRINCIPESSA” took me ~30 hours + 7 month + 15 years of passion for handmade felt and mixed media textile art techniques.
Genesis of a reversible, mixed media nunofelt art vest
For this “PRINCIPESSA” wearable art vest, I started to make white and gray nunofelt, by laying out 3 layers of merino wool fibers on finest gray and white silk fabrics. By manually rubbing the layered wool with warm water, fibers get connected with each other and also fuse into the silk fabric. It’s an amazing natural process. To get more insights, please check this video!
The layout & felting part generally takes me 4 to 8 hours. In the case of the princess art vest this was by far the fastest part.
Keeping it simple for the mixed media fun
I seldom felt in gray and white only, most of the time I compose a more colorful background in fiber painting techniques. For this art vest I kept is simple as I wanted to create the design with paints, embroidery and appliqués in a more mixed media style . The inspiration for this one came from a wall hanging I was working on at the same time: my daughter in a fairy inspired portrait style.
So once felted and shaped in form, I started painting it with black and silver textile paints, altering the surface and adding some stains and more or less abstract shapes.
Working on both sides to let inspiration fly
I always work on both sides simultaneously. One side inspires the other. It’s a bit like painting blind. Sometimes there are great surprises, and sometimes you have to deal with things that don’t work but that’s very stimulating and for me part of the process!
Embroidery on felt
Sometimes inspiration doesn’t show up as expected and for this art vest the delay was very long. I put it away many times with a feeling of frustration. Finally I started to embroider it without being really satisfied by the achieved painting.
I started embroidering my felt work in 2010. In the beginning I thought to just make some piece mixing felt and embroidery but finnaly felt and embroidery work so well together that I can’t imagine nowadays a piece without embroidery. Embroidery adds depth and raises the surface. It adds shine and elegance to the felt.
Even so I embroider for year now, I’m always surprised the hours that flies into the embellishing part. The “PRINCIPESSA” art vest is heavily embroidered with small circle shapes and it took me days!
As usual I just started somewhere with some cercle shaped stitching, hoping to get inspired. But on this first attempt, inspiration hasn’t been around and finally the vest ended up hanging in my workshop for several weeks. I spent a lot of time just starring on it!
Inspirations strokes always by surprise
Inspiration always takes me by surprise. It happens most often when I do not expect it. When inspirations strikes, it’s exiting. It starts with a glimpse of an idea and suddenly ideas overwhelm you… . It’s this experience that got me addicted to creative work. If you never tried it – don’t hesitate it’s better than taking drugs! But be warned: it’s also much harder to get as it is unpredictable!
When inspired, I don’t want to eat, I don’t want to sleep, I just want to ride further on the creative wave.!
By the way , this is how I stopped smoking long time ago!
Inspiration is unpredictable
Unfortunately this impulsion of creativity may stop as sudden as it strikes. This happened for this wearable garment. Luckily I’ve learnt, over the years, not to insist when this happens and just stopped working on the vest for several months.
As expected long time after the final idea(s) came up and allowed me to finalise the vest in less than 48 hours.
I added the last fabric scraps in free motion application and also went in with more paint – this time I used bold colors instead of back and silver.
So, how long does it take o create a reversible art vest?
In this case maybe 25 – 30 hours of “manual work” but also hours and days of thinking and observing.
7 month passed by from the first wool layout up to the day I decides that the art vest was finished. And still I never now: - may be I will go in again in a couple of month or years… :)
