silk and needle felting question

[MamaWolfe]

I just tried my hand at Nuno felting and am wondering, can I needle felt onto the silk? I don't want to risk a test cause I'm pretty sure it will just rip up the silk, but it would be really nice to have a bit more control! Thanks!!!

[zech13_9_goforgold]

I'm a bit confused. If you want to needle felt silk- it won't happen. You can only felt wool. If you want to lay the wool on the silk and try to felt the two together- it won't happen. Other than those two possibilities, I'm not sure what else you could be asking. Perhaps you could reword your question?

[Rhiannon Feimorgan]

I haven't done much needle felting, mostly wet felting. Sometimes I would lay silk fibers (or other fibers) over the top layer of wool. The wool would hold on to it and it would change the texture of the surface. I'm not sure how that would work with needle felting. I would think that you could needle felt with a wool silk blend but not so much wool onto silk by itself.

I would fgind some scraps and test it tough.

I've never hears of Nuno felting, how does that work?

[MamaWolfe]

Nuno felting is a traditional Japanese art form. It's where you take silk fabric, overlay wool on top of it, then felt them together. The wool grabs ahold of the silk and they "become one." I've tried it, it works (I'll post pics later). Nuno felting is a wet felting process. I just want to needle felt so I can add some more structured felt pieces, I'm just afraid of shredding the silk in the process. Maybe i'll just give it a try and see what happens!

[flapjack]

If you're going to do it, I'd put a layer of wool on the other side of the silk so that there's something for the wool fibres to grab on to- which should hopefully avoid exposing the holes in the fabric. It would be possible to incorporate pieces of felt into your nuno felt, though- I think you'd need to have a layer of wool fibres between the felt and the silk and ideally a layer of wool fibres on the outside to hold it all together.

[MamaWolfe]

That's a really good idea, I'll give it a try! Thanks!