Felting Slippers from Sparse Wool

Today, once again, the fashion of manual labor, the manufacture of jewelry and clothing patterns in the old traditional ways comes into fashion again. And now it was the turn to the fact that the handicraftsmen began to manually roll valenki and slippers made of wool!

Felting slippers is a rather laborious task, requiring attention, time and perseverance. Although, frankly, to sit during this procedure is unlikely to have to.

So, the felting begins with the fact that the model is invented: slippers can be with curled noses, like Turkish ones, or without backs - flip-flops, or ordinary "cats", like they were called in ancient times.

"Cats" also differ:

1. On the height of the pagolens (only covering the foot or half boots with a bell, cut or solid);
2. By color (monophonic or with a pattern of several colors of wool);
3. On embellishments (with embroidery, appliqués, brooches or beads, fur osoyuzhkoy or sewn embellishments in the form of artificial flowers, also made by hand from cloth, leather or from a stocked material).

Based on the chosen model, the master must purchase the raw material. Felting slippers requires special wool, which can be purchased either in specialized handicraft shops, such as the "Lölöka" store, or ordered from the online store. To buy wool by means of the World Wide Web is almost twice cheaper than in the store, but this will take two weeks.

Further, felting from the wool of the slipper goes to the preparatory stage: you need to make a pattern. To do this, the newspaper should draw a future home footwear "in profile", just as it is depicted by children. You can even take your sock and circle it.

Then this figure increases by one third along the entire contour: when the crocheting of slippers goes into the stage of immediate "rolling", the wool shrinks about 3 times. The ready-made pattern is transferred to polyethylene, folded on the upper part, opposite to the foot, and the contour of the pattern is transferred again. Thus, one pattern is obtained, along which there will be a felting of two slippers, which will then be cut into two parts.

To make it clearer, you can put two sock in front of you, connecting them closely with those holes where your foot is being stuck - so a pattern for felting should look like.

Now Felting slippers Goes into the stage of layout of wool on a pattern. It should be laid in even thin layers, slightly protruding the pattern so that it is possible to fold the excess. In no case should the hair cut with scissors, just tear! Otherwise, the connecting "seams" will turn out to be coarse, strongly protruding above the common surface, which will greatly damage the appearance of the product.

After laying the first layer you need to moisten the wool slightly with a warm soap solution and turn the pattern over. Wrapping the protruding woolen excess on yourself, the same manner is laid the first layer of the other side. Wetted, turned over. Surplus bends.

The second layer of wool is laid across the first. The stacking algorithm is repeated. You can lay the third layer, and if you want - and the fourth. Only observe the transverse styling of the wool and the uniformity of its distribution!

Now it is necessary to wet the wool with soapy water and can even be soaped with a piece of soap and gently rubed in circular motions, so that the top layer "fell" into a solid base, on which the direction of the rows could not be seen. You need to do this on both sides.

Then the master proceeds to the process of "rolling away". To do this, you need a rolling pin: the workpiece is rolled out like a test, in different directions, for about half an hour.

Cutting the resulting part in the middle and taking out a pattern from the inside, we will get two details. The next action will be "washing" slippers in soapy water. They need to crumple, squeeze, rub - how would you wash a heavily soiled gauze. Perfectly suitable for this are old-style washing boards of the "wave" type.

Experienced craftswomen use at this stage washing machines - machines - they perfectly "beat off" woolen products. Sometimes resort to scalding parts in order to reduce their volume. During this action, you need to pay special attention to the places of joining the layers of wool: they must be constantly smoothed, so that they practically merge with the main cloth.

When the volume more or less decreases, the slippers are worn on the foot or on the mannequin and begin to rub, from time to time soaping, already in this position giving the things the necessary shape.

The finished product is put to dry in the air (but not on the battery) in a straightened form, trying not to spoil the shape. After drying, you need to carefully trim the edge of the razor, decorate the slippers to taste. You can sew a rubber sole - then they will serve much longer!