Dawn: Felting from Knitted Fabrics
Due April 29, 2010
I knit slippers and felted them in my washing machine!
The yarn is Istex Lett-Lopi which I received as a gift from a friend who visited Iceland. It is a single-ply yarn so it felts easily. I knit it following the pattern for French Press Felted Slippers from the French Press Knits blog. I knit on gauge with size US15 (metric 10) needles. They were metal and heavy and I hated them. But they worked! I also ran low on yarn so I knit the bottoms with two strands of lighter purple yarn and one strand of the dark purple. It gives the slippers a faux-sole look. Because I have very narrow feet I made the bottoms two stitches narrower throughout in hopes that they would fit better.
Knitting:
The pattern had 4 pieces per slipper: two sides, the bottom, and the strap. That meant 8 pieces total.
After weaving in the ends and sewing them together, they looked more slipper-like.
Felting was a bit adventurous. The directions said to put the pieces in a pillowcase, tie it shut, and put into the washer on hot water. Agitate and check every 5 minutes. It also said to NOT let it spin, no rinsing. My process wasn't exactly the same. The pillowcase kept coming unknotted so I put everything in a mesh lingerie bag with a zip top. I let it agitate for more than 25 minutes at 5-minute intervals before forgetting to check it so everything went through the rinse and spin cycle. I caught it before the final rinse and looked at the slippers and they had finally felted to size! The nearly-dry state was also a plus for letting it spin.
Overall, a very successful knitting and felting experience!
Next up: adding electronics.
Thoughts, Improvements, Suggestions
- This pattern had a lot of seaming. One quarter of the total time to make the slippers was spent sewing.
- The agitation took a while. Why aren't you supposed to let it rinse and spin? It didn't seem to do anything detrimental to my knitting.
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