Our June Kit was themed around Parrots and featured some wonderful dye that I’m so happy with. The gold Bamboo and the blue on the Romeldale fleece turned out so amazing. We hope this was a real pleasure to open!
This month’s kit came with Romeldale wool from Full Measure Farm who is a local to us homestead. We are so proud to work with this family in improving their wool quality and helping them to expand their flock and be able to offer more sheepy products. Kindra and her husband are the kindest souls and their farm land is beautiful and their sheep are spoiled and complete sweethearts. I purchased my very first fleeces from her and that wool taught me so much about fleece processing. I’m so excited they will be expanding their Romeldale flock with an impressive Moorit ram this year and new ewes. Romeldale are a threatened status conservation breed per the Livestock Conservancy, so we are deeply excited to see people work towards expanding the population further. Support Full Measure Farm on their Etsy!
Romeldale wool is wonderful for so many types of projects. It is typically a very fine and matte fiber that is excellent for next to skin projects while still being wonderfully elastic and sporting a cozy bloom to the fiber post wash. I would describe this fiber as being very plush. Please be sure to check out our series of blog posts on how to prepare fleece for carding before you get started with her.
June Moodboard
For the blend, we brought in a bit of the tropics these birds would naturally call home with the Banana Fiber included in the kit. You will also find immense shine in the Bamboo and Tussah Silk that will contrast beautifully against the matte fiber. Both of these will also accent the softness of the Romeldale. Bringing in a hint of texture to the blend is a bit of bold pulled Sari Silk roving.
Splitting for a Gradient
I went ahead and made a sample from the kits myself to share how a gradient can be made by splitting the wool and carding a few passes extra of a blended version of the two colors. This creates another color that is a mix of the two and makes for an easier transition between touching colors of fiber! Really fun to do with multicolored natural fleeces also. It helps to keep the colors separate until you create the final batt.
Final Batt
Catch us on our Discord Chat Server linked on the website or on our Instagram with your projects. We are really dying to see what you all come up with and to know your opinions on the kit. Thank you again and happy blending!
Thank you guys so much for joining us on this trip for the year as we explore a different breed of fleece and a range of additive fibers through our subscription boxes! I have honestly had just the best time putting these together for you all. This is really going to help us expand on supporting small farms which is the dearest thing to us.
This month’s kit opens with a gorgeous inky black Romney fleece that took first place at MSWF in 2019. We have been holding onto Lola for a special something and this was absolutely the ticket. She does a fantastic job showcasing what a 4 year old Romney ewe can produce on a fleece on the finer and softer end of the breed. You will see she has very bold and blocky locks with the notable “french fry” crimp. Her locks sport minimal crossing fibers, or fibers that cross between multiple locks, which helps make them very definable. Romney sheep hail from marsh lands which means they needed to shake all the excess water from their wool frequently. These open and defined fleeces were important for their health! Please be sure to check out our series of blog posts on how to prepare fleece for carding before you get started with her.
April Moodboard
We chose an easy and reliable natural blend of Tussah Silk, Soy Silk, and Bamboo. Each of these fibers holds a variety of luster that does well to accent her shiny fleece. A good art batt comes from a variety of texture and shine depth! The colors are representative of the ocean depths and bright corals that April is themed after. Feel free to add or omit fibers to your heart’s content! Each additive fiber included should be enough for a batt with Lola and more depending on how saturated you would like to card it up.
Catch us on our Discord Chat Server linked on the website or on our Instagram with your projects. We are really dying to see what you all come up with and to know your opinions on the kit. Thank you again and happy blending!
We’ve got your picked and prepped fleece, so now we are ready to make the actual batts! We went over the basic uses of a drum carder in the prior post when we prepped fleece and this is just going to go over the basics of art batts and blending choices. We really suggest spending time playing around with your equipment afterwards. Everyone develops their own unique voice in their fiber through practice. There is nothing I love more than seeing the mark everyone leaves on their individual craft!
Art Batts
When carding an art batt, there are many choices to keep in mind. Are you working towards a textural art piece or a specific project? Are you looking for a smooth and easy spin or a chunky drafter? What colors and textures are you looking to delight your hands with?
When we card batts, we are usually looking for smooth drafting and textural art spins. Be it the spots on a frog or the rough texture of bark, they all play a part in my batt decisions right down to the base fiber. For color choices, your preferences for palettes play a huge role, but it really helps to be familiar with the basics of color theory. We love pulling from references images. They can really help visualize a color palette before applying it to your fiber.
Art Blending vs. Project Blending
Fiber arts lend another dimension to color art by giving it the ability to be felt through touch and then manipulated again into a useful object. With this in mind, texture tends to be a high mark on our fiber choices. Art Batts blended with bold textures are more about having pops of interest than blending fibers with a project in mind. The individual pops of silk are not going to lend their strength and luster to the entire yarn as shown above. It is only going to affect the area that it lies in. That is where blending in thin, consistent layers would come in handy when working towards a project goal. Are you looking for strong socks? For project blending, your batts might entail several very thin and well distributed layers of strong fleeces. You would want it blended in a way that each wool would be drafted and spun the entire length of the yarn instead of creating small pockets of lent strength.
So how do you go about bringing all of that to life?
Let’s take this guy into consideration as a batt reference. He has an excellent color palette to go off of and we know his skin is not going to be slick and smooth. We can choose a creamy base fiber that has a grit to it. Let’s say a coarser wool like Corriedale or Romney. His orange stripes and grey eyes could be your silks. There is a coffee brown color that we could do as a bamboo and splashes of white undyed fiber to capture the color around his mouth. His brown is also a speckle and his gentle scale texture could come alive in a silk noil or a sari silk. Having a wide variety of different shine or matte finish in your fibers will truly add depth to your batts.
Layers on a Tunis Batt
When carding the art batt you are going to want many layers of textures. If you put all of your special goodies and let’s say they make up 1/4 of the weight of your whole batt, when you go to draft that fiber for the yarn you are going to end up with vast areas of wool only and your bits will be lost in the whole. If you broke that up into a sandwich style with wool, bits, wool, bits…etc. then they will be more distributed throughout the yarn when spun. Textural elements are lovely either fed under the licker-in on a carder to thin them out and distribute them or hand painted onto the larger drum for direct control. Just beware of those teeth and apply it safely!
Splitting Solids for a Smoother Gradient
Another way to tackle our gecko friend is as a gradient or striped batt. We could forego his textures and pay close attention to the layout of his colors for stripes or the tones of the palette for a gradient. Gradients are easiest achieved when the color is dyed as one on the base fiber, but can be made from solids with ease. If you were making a white, tan, and brown gradient to match the gecko from solid wool, you would take an equal portion of each color to blend middle tones before making the batt. By running the adjacent colors together through the carder multiple times, you are able to blend a new color that will smooth out your gradient when you card it.
Determining your layer count and how you would like your texture and color arrangement will make splitting your fibers up accordingly much easier. For instance, having 4 wool layers and 4 additive layers planned will have you split your materials in quarters to have each layer the same. You could also make every layer something different. You can make it as free and organically made or as structured as you like. Some people like to go as far as weighing each individual fiber by percentages. Your craft is really all about how you want to experience it. When it comes to the actual carding, if you are looking for an easily drafting yarn, thinning your fibers out and utilizing the licker-in drum is going to be the best route. If you would like something that cards very chunky, thin your fibers less. The way a fiber rolls onto the larger drum is how it is going to come off and application can make a large difference in spinning experience.
Pulling Rolags and Roving
An art batt or project batt is not all your equipment can make! Utilizing a diz, you can pull roving off as shown below.
Or using a pair of dowel rods or chopsticks and a steady pull and rolling can produce sets of rolags with some practice!
Thank you so much for joining us on this mini series about preparing fiber and the considerations to make when making batts. We hope you had fun and will keep some of these thoughts and practices in mind as you pursue your own creative endeavors. And do remember, everything in your craft is about how you want to experience it and everyone develops their own methods and beautiful voices in their own mediums. We can’t wait to see yours! If you are looking for supplies, check out our Washed Fleece section or sign up for our Mystery Fleece Blender subscription!
Fossil Fibers 