Category Archives: felt hat

Noody-what?

I am often asked what inspires the pieces I make, the truth is inspiration can strike anywhere, sometimes it is the materials themselves, the pattern on a piece of sari silk or the tassels on a charity-shop scarf for example. Nature is another great source, the textures of a patch of lichen or orange-crimson autumnal leaves against a bright blue sky. Memories from holidays or previous careers such as watching cells growing in a petri dish from my days as a “lab rat”.

As some of you may know, I used to SCUBA dive a lot and frequently draw inspiration for my felting from the underwater world, for my new collection I couldn’t resist the gloriously colourful world of nudiranchs (pronounced noo-dee-branks). I confess I have been slightly obsessed with these little sea slugs for more than 20 years but the usual response when I try to describe them to non-divers is, “noody-what?” Their name means naked gills in latin and refers to the fern-like gill structures you can often see sprouting from their backs.

I love them because they are so outrageously colourful  and don’t seem to care who sees them strutting their stuff in the magical aquatic world. I can’t think of a better muse to create a fabulously colourful set of wearable art, deep down, who wouldn’t want to be a nudibranch? 🙂 If you google “nudibranch photos” you will get a taste of their fantastically beautiful world and the colours will be much less washed out than those in my photos.

 

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The Pink Dorid nudibranch was my muse for this hat and gloves set.

Now I just need to find a human who is as exuberant and fun-loving as a nudibranch to wear them…. 😉

Hat Fest

Bridport Hat Festival has crept up on me, I have quite a few hats but, they are like shoes, you can never have too many! So this month I have been spending every spare moment making more stock and trying out some new ideas and developing some old favourites with a new twist…

The pink unicorn:

 

is a variant of the horned viking:

 

Finishing up some hats started in a workshop with Zsofia Marx:

 

Experimenting with wire and other inclusions between the layers of felt:

 

 

Adding flaps to give a new dimension:

Do you think I should leave this one white / cream or dye it? It feels quite anaemic sat next to all the others but maybe it is good to offer some neutral options for sale?

“Haturday” starts at 10 am Saturday 1st September 2018 in Bridport, Hampshire, UK. Check out this link for more information. If you are in the area please pay us a visit, its a free event with lots of live music and entertainment and of course I can be found with the International Feltmakers Association in the Arts Centre behind the main stage. Why not pay us a visit, try on a few hats for fun and have a giggle? 🙂