• Michief, Needle-felted Unicorn Music Box
    Crafts

    Wool Felting: The 6,000 Year Old Fiber Art

    What is felting? Felting with wool fleece is the oldest form of fiber art, older than knitting or even sewing. As soon as people began domesticating livestock, they harvested wool to make sturdy and warm blankets, hats and boots. A simple form of felting is to boil fleece (or a knitted garment) until it shrinks and hardens into felt. Needle felting is the art of sculpting wool with a special needle. Wool roving (unspun wool) is poked repeatedly, until it compacts into a solid shape. At that point, the wool can be sculpted with the needle. Generally, no gluing or stitching is needed. What is so special about a felting…