Category Archives: challenge

The 30 day Folding Challenge Part 4

My productivity for this challenge has really slowed over the last few weeks because I treated myself to taking Fiona Duthie’s Felt Illuminated online course. While it has been a substantial time (and financial) investment it has already sent my thoughts off in new directions. Some of these ideas involve how I can combine paper in my felted sculptures but also wondering if I can also illuminate some of these folded structures too….

Spoiler alert! I am definitely going to finish this 30 day challenge, but not all of the days will be consecutive 🙂

Day 22

Revisiting the Kaleidocyle designs from Day 19 to see if I could make a cardboard one that turns like the felted ones do. This one was double the length of the first paper kaleidocycle attempt. It cycles really easily but doesn’t look as pretty when folded up, perhaps it needs an extra segment, or two?

Day 23

Inspired by Fiona’s Felt Illuminated class I tried using paper in place of some wool layers, this first one wasn’t too successful, the area where there was just paper and no wool became extremely fragile and limited how much I could full the piece.

Day 24

Trying again, but this time cutting the paper where I wanted to place the folds. This piece was much more successful, although I could definitely full this tiny bowl some more. I have added a few stitches at the top of the pleats for security but the paper in this bowl allows it to keep its shape without them.

Day 25

While searching for origami books I found another awesome book in the Auckland Library catalogue: Folding Techniques for Designers From Sheet to Form by Paul Jackson.

He makes no apologies for starting with some really basic shapes and forms but they get more complex as you progress through the book, this is where the clear diagrams / maps he provides invaluable.

This shape naturally wanted to form a bridge or trough depending on which way up it was placed

Day 26

I’m curious to see how this form will behave if the pattern is repeated?

Day 27

What if I used a 5 point symmetry instead of 4?

Day 28

I love the architecture of this form, it looks lovely from all angles, I’m wondering if I can make it into a bowl form…

Day 29

This one is screaming, “Christmas decoration!” at me, I imagine the felted version of this one will involve some bling 🙂

Day 30

I started playing with the shape from Day 29, exploring what would happen if I reversed some of the folds, so mountain folds became valley folds…

Unfortunately someone else requested this book before I could get any further, so I could not try out all the forms I wanted to before I had to return it. I will borrow it again though, it is an inspiring book!

While my original 30 day challenge complete, this idea still has lots of mileage left in it and I plan to continue exploring, especially taking more of the paper sculptures into fibre… Watch this space!

Have you been playing along? If so, please share where your journey is taking you, links in the comments to a FB page, IG or blog post should work if you have any images.

Adding Dimension

This quarter, the FFS challenge is to add dimension to our felt, on the face of it I should find this challenge easy, almost everything I make is 3D in nature but that rather seems to defeat the purpose, after all, surely a challenge should be just that! 🙂

Last weekend I had a mini epiphany; I really like the effect of shibori felt like the brooch below but using the “tie in a stone/button/marble technique” is not very practical when you are creating a 3D object over a resist as you need extra felt to stretch over the inclusions and it invariably makes the surrounding felt uneven too. I woke up on Sunday morning and my first thought was to create these cup shapes separately and then attach them to the main piece of felt. Is it really sad that I am now dreaming about felt?

This was the piece made with the separate resists. It was very slow work making these 7 little cups and I’m not sure I will use this method a lot but it was interesting to try and I’m happy with the result.

IMG_7548

IMG_7551

IMG_7549

This box is quite large, just shy of a foot square and 5 inches tall.

I wanted to make a small bowl inspired by this pine cone, it started out as a bowl but I clearly wasn’t concentrating while laying out the flaps and spikes so it became a pod instead… 🙂

IMG_7567

IMG_7650

IMG_7649

Finally, I started working on a new vest top that I have been thinking about since attending a dress-making course with Cristina Pacciani at the beginning of July, it still needs some shaping in the back and around the collar but you can already see all the texture from the silk and felt ropes laid under the silk. Originally I was going to make this in royal blue chiffon but then decided white habouti would better showcase the different textures.

IMG_7664

IMG_7656

IMG_7655

 

What are you planning for the 3rd quarter challenge?