Last week I received a wonderful book for my birthday from my brother and sister-in-law: 500 Felt Objects, from Lark Books. The book is edited by Nathalie Mornu and Susan Brown served as the juror. Susan Brown is the assistant curator at the Cooper Hewitt, which exhibited Fashioning Felt back in 2009.

Left: by Michaela Gregoretti (Tinakela)   Right: by Vanderbos

The book is pure inspiration, whether you love felt like I do, or not. But what’s not to love? Felt has amazing properties, it can be strong, soft, rigid, drapey, sculptural, delicate, you name it. It’s a dream to work with.

Left: by Lone Asbjerg   Right: by Latifa Medjdoub

And such a variety of techniques and textures can be achieved through stitching, cutting, slashing, shibori, nuno, dyeing, and combining with other fibers and materials.

by Catherine Drieux of ARCHIbidouilles

This blue laser cut scarf jumped off the page at me! Does that ogee shape look familiar? What a brilliant idea to incorporate a string of them into a scarf. And it all begins with a flat square of felt.

by Yvonne Wakabayashi

This chartreuse shibori shawl (say that 3 times fast) speaks to me! I’ve dabbled in shibori with my own recycled sweater felting. I’d love to experiment with it more, especially after thumbing through this book!

by Janice Arnold

Look at this gorgeous installation by Janice Arnold called “Chroma Passage”! You may remember the yurt she created for the Fashioning Felt exhibit that I blogged about. I can’t imagine executing a piece on this enormous scale. It really is beautiful with the light showing through.

There is so much to be inspired by in this book. I wish I could show it all! To see more, check out Lark Books mini gallery. Mmmmm, felty goodness!