Felted wool is the hot material for crafting today! While you can buy felted wool by the yard, did you know that you can easily make your own?
All you need is a knitted wool piece. This can be a swatch you knitted yourself or an old sweater. Just put the piece that you want to felt into an old pillowcase bag (the kind that zip closed),fill your washing machine with the hottest water possible and the lowest fill setting. Set your machine to agitate for the longest time possible. Check your pieces after about 10 minutes or so to see if the pieces are shrinking and acquiring a felted look. Reset the machine to agitate some more (don’t let the water drain) and repeat until you have the desired size and degree of felting. Let your machine drain and take out the felted pieces. Rinse in cool water, squeeze out the water and lay on a terry towel to dry. Pin the piece down and if you want to shape it you can put a bowl (for a rounded shape) or square weight on it. Let it dry completely. A similar process is used with raw wool (not made into yarn yet) and agitating by hand.
Here are some examples of the kinds of items available for felting wool from etsy street supply team members
