Early on, we made a decision to use only wool-blend felts on our Minikins. Since we avoid synthetics everywhere else, it wasn't much of a decision, really. The marked differences between good wool-rayon blend and synthetic crafting felts are obvious immediately. The wool blends look better, feel better, last longer, are easier to work with, offer better colors, and on and on. Difficult to find in our rural area, online shopping brings a rainbow of felt to our front door. Well, actually, the Postal and UPS guys bring it, but you know what I mean. Yes, both kinds of felt do contain synthetic dyes in those vibrant colours, but our customers love the variety offered by them.
We began by using National Nonwovens felt, purchased at PrairiePointJunction.com. We've now worked with both 20/80 and 35/65 blends and can't really tell the difference. The thickness tends to run close to the same for both blends. We've got a stash of nearly all 108 colours available right now (with a few discontinueds in the box), and we still wish there were more choices. Isn't that the way it always is? Mom says that we were three years old and thought that the 64-color Crayola crayon box was too limiting in its choices. Guess you don't outgrow certain things. The only thickness issue, in our opinion, is that most of the light pastels have
"thin spots" where you can see through them. It looked like fabric
that's been pulled too far. We'll have to cut around these spots, so that does make them a little less desirable. Worth mentioning, also, is the fact that all three "white" choices (i.e., white, linen and antique white) smell terrible. This felt, across the board, has no wool or gamey odor (wish it did); but most of them have no odor at all. The colours seem to be nice and standardized, so re-ordering has not been a problem. We highly recommend the folks at Prairie Point Junction--great variety, quick service, reasonable shipping, and they let us order in 1/8th-yard increments. Thanks, PPJ!
(For those of you who care about these things, we did contact National Nonwovens about the wool content in their blend felts. The reply that we got was a long time coming and not very informative, but here it is: "Australian Fine Tops with a blend of Merino Sheep’s wool". I asked them what "Australian Fine Tops" are and how much Merino was included, but they never answered. So, that's all I know.)
Production was rolling along well, and we thought we were all settled in and knew what we wanted. Then we discovered bamboo-rayon felt at TaDaaStudioFelt on Etsy. Not very many colours, but there are times when Elizabeth wanted a drapier felt for some of the women's garments. A quick order of a 6x9" sample pack, and she was absolutely hooked. If you know Elizabeth, you can hear her now, "I'm never going to use anything else again!" Not as many colours as wool, but its softness and ability to hold together while micro-stitching the edges grabbed her attention immediately.
We did look at a non-toxic, European 100% merino felt. A sample was sent to us, but it was too thick and scratchy for our needs. Nice that everything is non-toxic, though, so we recommend looking into it for other uses.
The rest of the wool-blend felt story is hardly noteworthy. Occasionally, we buy wool from JoAnn's (with our 40% coupon). It's National Nonwovens, too, but is limited by the store in color choices (and the regular price is higher than PPJ). Still, if we need the colors they happen to have in stock, we can't resist the savings. The only other thing worth mentioning is our purchase of Benzie Merino Felt. A little more expensive than PPJ, since you can only order it by the sheet, but the Merino caught our attention (and we always try to support individuals before large companies). We enquired, before purchasing, asking if they were selling the same National Nonwovens felt which we already owned. They just answered that we would "love" their "merino felt", so we excitedly ordered what we thought was a different line of felt. Turns out that it was the same National Nonwovens felt that we already owned, renamed by someone, so that we spend a lot of time trying to match it up. It's in a box by itself, and Elizabeth doesn't use it on anything which might have a repeat order. It's a pain, but live and learn. If you're only going to re-order from Benzie, you'll be fine. Just be sure that you don't order a stash of NN from someone else before doing so (smile)!
At the end of the day, we're all thrilled to have so many choices in colour and texture. Thickness, flexibility, sturdiness . . . lots of fun waiting for us in these more natural choices from the felt world. Once you've worked with one of these felts, you'll never go back to that synthetic stuff from the chain stores. You might consider ordering some variety packs in cut sheets before jumping in the deep end. It's a nice way to try things out!
Philippians 2:3-11
No comments:
Post a Comment