Techniques
Hand painted silk begins life as a piece of plain white silk.
Sometimes it is background dyed, sometimes not, but before drawing on the fabric, it is stretched out and then taped or pinned to a frame. Some designs use the 'serti' method where gutta outlines are painted on and then filled with colour. Gutta can be clear, but it is also available in many different shades. Pat uses mostly gold and clear guttas in her work.
Gutta outlines are not the only way of working. Other patterns are made free-hand, sometimes thickening the paint to give more control, sometimes wetting the fabric, meaning much less control with dyes drifting across in a more random manner, producing a marvellous watercolour 'wet-in-wet' appearance.
Sometimes it is background dyed, sometimes not, but before drawing on the fabric, it is stretched out and then taped or pinned to a frame. Some designs use the 'serti' method where gutta outlines are painted on and then filled with colour. Gutta can be clear, but it is also available in many different shades. Pat uses mostly gold and clear guttas in her work.
Gutta outlines are not the only way of working. Other patterns are made free-hand, sometimes thickening the paint to give more control, sometimes wetting the fabric, meaning much less control with dyes drifting across in a more random manner, producing a marvellous watercolour 'wet-in-wet' appearance.
Whichever method is used, the colour must be 'fixed' after painting.
Sometimes this can be done by ironing, but iron fixed paints have more effect on the silk, making it harder and with less of that silkiness we expect from this lovely fabric. Pat prefers to steam, sometimes in the microwave, sometimes in an industrial steamer for three or four hours, leaving the silk gloriously shiny as well as keeping the fabric's 'handle'.
Once the colour has been fixed, each silk is washed, rinsed and ironed.
Many of the designs can involve several different techniques, such as dyeing before stretching, over-dyeing, applying gutta, painting, re-dyeing and gilding.
Sometimes this can be done by ironing, but iron fixed paints have more effect on the silk, making it harder and with less of that silkiness we expect from this lovely fabric. Pat prefers to steam, sometimes in the microwave, sometimes in an industrial steamer for three or four hours, leaving the silk gloriously shiny as well as keeping the fabric's 'handle'.
Once the colour has been fixed, each silk is washed, rinsed and ironed.
Many of the designs can involve several different techniques, such as dyeing before stretching, over-dyeing, applying gutta, painting, re-dyeing and gilding.
Pat talks about Felt Making
I practise cold felting - that is, I use cold water instead of the more usual hot in order to produce my felt so that I can add loads of other fibres and lots of texture if I want to. Adding hot water means the wool felts together faster than other fibres and leaves me with less choices.
The wool is wool 'tops' - fibres that have been washed and cleaned and combed but are not spun.
These bits of fluff are laid out on a beach mat or on bubble wrap depending on the weight I expect the finished felt to be. When they are laid out to my liking, I place old net curtain over the top and 'wet out' the wool.
I use Olive oil soap to lower the specific gravity of the wool and enable it to absorb the water, but not so much as to create lots of foam. I work the fibres a while before removing the net carefully, then work them some more by hand until they have got together a bit. Wool has tiny hooks and the idea is to bully the hooks together to create a fabric. Sometimes this fabric will be one or two layers of wool - very fine - sometimes more layers if I'm making a hat or a bag.
My felt is never very thick, not even when I'm making a jacket. I prefer to add silk or muslin or even some silk fibres to reinforce the felt rather than add loads of layers and produce something heavy. Most of my felt is what I call flimsy felt, rather than true cobweb, although both may contain holes if that is my design.
Once the felt is looking as though it will hold together, I roll it up in the mat or bubble wrap and roll it for about ten minutes or longer if it has lots of odd fibres in it, like soya bean, or cotton, which will not easily felt and need to be trapped within the wool. It is then turned and rolled some more.
This is the felting stage completed.
It must then be fulled.
Fulling is when I add very hot water and work the felt some more - to shrink the wool fibres down further and make sure that they are all anchored together. This is probably the most important stage, the fulling.
After squeezing out most of the water, I then shape my hat or garment, using my hands, a hat block, wooden spatulas, a steamer, whatever I can get hold of that will set the shape I am after.
Then all the soap must be washed out or my felt will rot.
And back for final shaping and drying.
I leave my felt to dry naturally for a day or two and then press them if they need it, though most don't.
Felting is hard work but very satisfying. Creating something interesting from what is essentially a bunch of fluff is quite amazing.