Experimenting

I’ve been experimenting with my growing collection of Cornish wools today.

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Please email any pictures of things you have made out of our lovely local wools.

Wool Donations

I had a wonderful email today from Claire at ‘The Wool directory’ offering me some wool from; Oxford Down, Badger Faced Welsh Mountain, Cotswold, Ryeland, and various other sheep, all from Cornwall.

Isn’t she just fantastic?!

I have also just dried my first lot of wool from the Black Welsh mountain sheep from up the road, what should I make first?

Expect me to be felting all day tomorrow, pictures to be posted.

Felt making demos & workshop

It’s time for me to do another felt workshop- this time to be held at the very wonderful Duchy of Cornwall Nursery on the 15th March. The day will cover all the basics of feltmaking, you will make your very own purse/pouch/glasses case to take home to keep forever or give as a present & the cost will be £30 per person to include all of the materials, tea/coffee & a delicious lunch in their award winning (my favourite) cafe. http://www.duchyofcornwallnursery.co.uk/

I will also be doing a few demo days for feltmaking in the same place so if you would like to come to meet me, if you have some questions or would like to become involved with The Cornish Wool project please do.

Wool Project

I would like to start a new project & I wondered if you might like to join in?

I teach felt making & rug- making classes www.loutonkin.wordpress.com , I also make my own products and art work using wool which I love but at the moment I do this with Merino wool which is beautiful (but not local) because it is easier & more readily available. What I would really like to do is use the wool from our very own county of Cornwall.

I would like to find small scale sheep keepers who keep their sheep for uses like keeping the grass down or breeding but don’t really know what to do with the wool. I used to keep sheep on a small scale & know how expensive it can be to have the wool processed & turned into balls of wool etc.

I would like my project to be a long term project involving as many sheep keepers as possible but what I need to start is a few willing sheep keepers & I would like your WOOL! Just a bit of it……I will clean it & card it, label it and use it, I will look at the best uses for your wool, experiment with it, but I will also put some of it documented into an exhibition piece.

To go with this exhibition piece I would like some information about you, as I would like the exhibition to travel. I would like to know where your sheep live, what sort of habitat they have, how many you have, why you got them to begin with? Your expectations on keeping them, Why you still keep them?  I would really, really like a photograph of you & your sheep.

I would hope that from this project we can show how useful our wool is & the value it has as a sustainable product. I would also eventually like to look towards getting some funding to teach you as individuals in workshops how to make simple products from your wools like your very own rugs & felted things.

I hope you like the idea of joining me on this project, please spread the word to other people you think might be interested.

Warmest regards,

Lou Tonkin.