Manhattan girl - a wool painted bag with a city landscape

Manhattan,

There is a huge picture hanging on one of my walls for years, 

my other half and I - bold and beautiful - and the Manhattan skyline in the background - taken of the New Jersey side of the Hudson, 

a skyline so much different that the one on the bag - wouldn't dare to use it felting today.

It's a very important picture, an unforgetable experience, wonderful memories, 

a great place to travel with my next pictorial bag.

Another bag with the city landscape. Handmade, wet felted, dry felted.

It took a lot of work to lay out the picture. After the process of wet felting, I used the needle to finish the buildings and to dry felt the girl with the curly blonde hair. The merino wool, silk, bamboo and linen mostly in all shades of blue - from the colors of the sky to the deepest tones of the river. 

If you remember, I've already presented this exact picture in one of my posts. 

It took me a while to finish the bag. 

For a reason.

And here is the trouble maker - the metal frame, simple in it's form - seems innocent and easy to be used. But don't let it fool you. I made so many attempts to attache it to the bag, I almost gave up.

Good thing, I'm stubborn enough to finally find my own way with it because I really like the bag. Colors of merino wool match my casual wardrobe and the bag is great for my every day errands.

It is my personal bag, I wear it almost every day

but I kind of dedicate the idea of it to all my readers from the USA who actually make the second largest group of people following my blog, right after the Polish one.

Warsaw wool painted - pictorial bag wet and dry felted - handmade

Another bag ... another city ...

... another landscape wool painted ... another pictorial felt I made. 

This time, I wool painted Warsaw's Old Town, which obviously is the oldest part of the capital city.

By the way, it is on the UNESCO's list of World Heritage Sites, so if you ever - by any chance - happen to visit Warsaw, don't forget to check for yourself if the landscape on my pictorial bag looks anything like the original.

To be exact, it is the Castle Square - between the Old Town colorful houses on your left and the Royal Castle on the right.

Tall Zygmunt's Column - or if you prefer - Sigismund's Column in front and the Cathedral behind - it's just the beginning of all tourist attractions.

And the girl - a redhead - dry felted like always.

She's kind of 3D with her hair and dress standing out of the felt surface.

My mystirious girls look differently with every pictorial bag.

I wet felted the bag using different colors of merino wool and silk, bamboo, linen to lay out the blue sky, the houses, Castle, greyish square and the Column.

After that, I used a felting needle to correct the lines of the buildings. The girl came last.

It is felted seamless and the back is in a shade of ash grey.

I finished the bag with a metal frame with a handle and a matching chain - which can be actually hidden inside.

This bag is really one of a kind.

It took a lot of work to finish it but the result is worth the effort.

wool painted poppies and a moon meadow pictorial bag - wet felted, handmade

red poppies ...

in a kind of a moon landscape

Seamless bag, wet felted only, made of fine merino wool in a very attractive  and my favourite shade of grey,

closed with a metal frame in the color of old silver,

a matching chain completes the look, vintage style.

Different tones of grey merino wool and silver silk and linen catch the moon light, 

flowers are contrasting with their bright redness,

tiny beads imitate natural seeds of poppies

Just couldn't leave you for Easter without any new posts of mine.

More felting projects in the process. More or less completed. 

As for me ... I spent some time sewing dresses for myself ... my private project runway ... cutting, sewing on my old sewing machine,experimenting with my own ideas ... had lots of fun ...

Have a very Happy Easter!

corn poppies wool painted on a wet felted bag, handmade

red poppies in the corn field ...

wool painted with fine merino in all natural colors - 

with the winter still going - make you hope for spring or even warm and sunny days of the summer.

A little handmade bag, wet felted only,

seamless, 20-26 cm x 25 cm.

Might be perfect for an elegant, even fancy occasion . 

Might go just as well with a summer dress or casual jeans.

The landscape on both sides of the bag. 

I like to make the backside interesting and suprising - whenever it's possible.

Once more, I used a metal frame in old gold with a chain in matching colors. I've already had some experience in sewing the frame and the bag together. It get's easier and easier every time you try. 

I like metal frames  and chains and honestly believe they add that extra look. 

An inspiration hanging on my living room wall. 

Even though I wasn't trying to copy the picture - the influence is pretty obvious. 

Poppies, wild flowers, wild nature all around - always inspire to work.

Just a sneak preview of another city landscape - Manhattan skyline and a mystirious blonde ...

... to let you know, I'm alive and well, felting whenever I catch a moment - 

some of my new work still waiting for finishing touches, just like the one on the photo,

some ready and photographed - wait to get on the blog. 

corn poppies wool painted - a meadow landscape wool painted on a wet felted bag with a vintage style metal frame

Looks like a real beauty...

... but believe me, was like a beast ...

The beautiful metal frame in gold - vintage style - with a maching chain. 

As promised, more metal frames in my craft work.

However, using this kind of sewn-in frame for the first time - I had to figure out how to put it all together: 

the bag, the frame and on top of that, the bright red lining inside the bag. 

It was a challenge but was worth the effort. Sewing by hand - with a sky blue tread - I tried and tried until I was happy with the result.

The silk lining matches the poppies in color - you might like it or not, but you can't say it is boring. Little details like that lining make a big difference - imagine - you open this bag and that bright redness just makes your day.

Because of all that trouble, it caused, I think the bag will have a special power, sort of a magic spell - it'll add some extra selfconfidence.

In the middle of winter with loads of snow everywhere, that snow we didn't have for Christmas - I suddenly wished to have just a bit of spring in January.

I don't believe that nobody cares about the back of the bag. 

I like when something is going on there even if it is just a single poppy blown by the wind to the other side.

I painted this picture with colors from sky blue, all shades of green to bright poppy red, laying down carefully every little bit of merino wool and silk to create the landscape. 

I wet felted it on a resist to get a seamless bag. 

These are the before and after photos. 

The bag was wet felted only, no neddle felting involved, no improvements were necessary.

Because I like it just the way it is.

The bag isn't too big - only 24 cm high, 27 cm wide at the bottom and 20 cm by the frame. 

A beautiful little thing for special occassions, perfect to make you feel like a woman.

sea-gulls and a girl coming from the Baltic sea waves - all wool painted on a hand felted bag

"mewa" means a sea-gull ...

... so thinking of sea-gulls, I came up with this seascape wool painted on another of my hand felted bags.

The bag  was wet felted for a very good cause - to support some educational projects planned for our children. So, I'm quite proud of that.

The girl standing on the sea coast was felted with the dry-felting needle after the wet felting process was all finished.

This time, the gilr matches the general colors I chose for the whole bag. She seems to be almost transparent with a dress made of some sea shaum, like she was coming from a white sea wave. I especially like her hair because it's a really nice result of another experiment of mine - dying with tea.

As you can see, the sea shore isn't all sandy, but with lot's of stones - like it happens on many beaches at the Baltic sea.

I felted the landscape with merino wool in different shades of blue - form sky-blue to dark navy and all grayish tones with a touch of sandy beige for the shore. In addition to that, lot's of silk, linen and bamboo treads were used for the shine and extra facture. 

Paris wool painted - a landscape on a wet felted bag - handmade

... we'll always have Paris...

A memory of Paris adventure captured on a hand felted bag.

The bag is just big enough for a wallet, a phone, keys and a few other necessities a woman usually carries with her; approximately 28x28 cm; Might be for special occasions or for every day arounds.

To paint this Parisian landscape I used merino wool in the wide range of colors I often like to use in my pictorial felting: from all greyish tones, shades of green, white to sky-blue and navy. 

The Parisian girl is dry felted with some black merino wool, silk fibers and Sari silk, also beaded with a few pink and emmerald green tiny beads, just to accentuate her outfit.

Allthough the colors on this picture are obviously unnatural, it exposes some details unvisible otherwise, like  this little, pink, pre-felted skirt, which is tridimmensional.

Seems like I'm already addicted to the concept of painting landscapes with merino wool on my hand felted bags. I know, that my vision of the process is different than other felters', because I learned felting techniques on my own, mostly by experimenting. That makes my pictorial felting unique. 

My head is full of ideas for next landscape wool-painting projects.

Too many ideas,, too little time to felt. 

And only 16 chocolates left in my Christmas calender!

I'd appreciate your comments on mewa.filcandfelt@gmail.com

Bag and the City - a wool painted hand felted bag

Wool painted...

that is how I like to describe my hand felted bags.

However, I often get an impression, that some people understand it the wrong way, like if it involved any brushes or paint. Not at all. On the contrary, wool painting is a process of laying out different colors of wool, silk fibers and any other materials in order to get a picture on a felt work. It has to be wet felted, too.

 

This particular picture you have already seen in one of my first posts on this blog. It is a part of a bigger project, of course.

For a moment, close your eyes and imagine big city lights in the distance...

The idea of using  this image in a pictorial felt work hounted me for quite a while, inspired by some interesting artworks I'd seen before. 

I live in green suburbs now, but I used to enjoy living in a big city. 

When a friend of mine asked me to felt a bag for her sister, who - at least for now - is a city girl, I thought it was time to give the idea a try. 

 The bag was supposed to be in blueish tones - to match jeans, just big enough for a wallet, a phone and some keys and ready for every day arounds.  

To achieve a result I wanted, I had to use different techniques in the process of felting, for example prefelt, nuno-felting and dry felting.

I chose Polish wool in a beautiful - and my favourite - blue color for the base of this project. It was actually nuno-felted on cotton, instead of silk. The whole picture, however, is made of merino wool in shades of blue, grey and white, with just a pinch of green for the leaves on the tree branches and yellow for the city lights. I also used a lot of silk, linen and bamboo fibers and some synthetic fibers as well.

The girl with the dog and the umbrella was dry felted with a dry felting needle using black merino wool, some wool locks in a very unusual shade of pinky - red and some colorfull Sari silk fibers.

The lining inside is made of cotton in natural ivory color, with two pockets, magnetic lock and the strap in a color contrasting with the bag itself, but matching  the tones of the girl's hair and outfit. 

It isn't the first of my pictorial felt projects, but it certainly is my favourite, so far. The idea of felting pictures has really grown on me. It seems to have endless possibilities in experimenting and trying out different combinations of techniques known to me, and looking for new techniques, forms and materials. And I know, that my projects are different that any other pictorial felt works.

I honestly don't know, what is going to happen to this bag, is this friend of mine going to like it? What's even more important in this case, would her sister like it?

I kind of like it myself. Won't be easy to let go of something so beautiful.