How to - Needle felting

By Spotlight

Needle felting or dry felting stems from an industrial process used to make large sheets of felt. Large beds of needles are moved in and out of the loose fibre to create the felt.

The felting needle used is a very sharp thin piece of hardened steel which has tiny barbs. Felt artists can use the needle to create very controlled designs and even three dimensional shapes that are more difficult to achieve using traditional wet felting techniques.

Materials

Your preference.

Step 1

Take a small amount of merino out of packaging and tease out some fibres. Lay thin strips of merino on to the foam block in a crisscrossing style. With your foam block on a flat surface take your needle and begin to push it into merino and foam block holding the needle straight up. Continue to poke the centre of merino with needle until wool starts to matt together.

Step 2

Fold over the merino teased ends so they lay over the centre. Continue to push needle into matted fibres moving them on the foam after every few stabs so the fibres won’t become embedded in the foam block.