Filling/stuffing for a wet felt doll

[josiebrat]

Hello,

Has anyone ever made a felted doll using a resist? If so what did you use for filling? I would like to fill it but also do additional sculpting on the face when finished. In this case would wool stuffing be best?
Thanks
Josie

[lyn]

Perhaps stuff the face with wool but the body with special soft toy filling.

If the felted doll is played with a lot, the wool stuffing in the body might eventually 'felt' into lumps?

[Shepherdess]

I would say wool but the right kind. supper wash so it won't felt or one of the none felting breeds and that depends on where you live. North American Dorset or Suffolk works well but in you are in the UK the wool is different and I hear people use it for felting. Lyn, what breads would be none felting there? Also, I would stuff the head, then do the sculpting before stuffing the body but you probably already knew that. I hope you share your progress and the finished doll.

[lyn]

Superwash wool is a good idea Ann!

I have no idea about breeds - I thought wool was treated chemically to make it superwash?

[josiebrat]

thanks ladies for your valuable feedback. I know I can always come to this forum when I have questions and get lots of feedback. I have some wool so i will take the suggestion of putting it in the face only, and filling rest of body with polyfil. This is just for me so it won't be played with much (ha). Just wanted to try something different with a group of friends. I'm thinking that I might prefer to stay with needle felt when it comes to dolls as I feel like I would have more flexibility with details. Anyway, I will share a photo when I finish. thanks again,

Josie

[Shepherdess]

Superwash is treated to prevent felting. Some breeds thou won't felt at all. People often spin them for socks that can go in the washing machine.

[MTRuth]

I look forward to seeing your doll Josie.

[Ann @ frabjous fabrica]

How about Jacob as (sort of) non-felting fibre?
I once tried to felt a Jacob dark brown colour fleece I had had for some time. It was scoured and rough carded (I think, it was so long ago that I can't really remember). I had come home early from a boring Guild meeting so decided to take my bad mood out on the felt and make a large mat. I laid it all out on an old sheet on the patio flagstones and stitched it inside. Chucked on buckets of soapy water and worked it with my feet. I suspect that the reason it held together (just) was, having sewn the fibres inside the sheet, I couldn't tell that I hadn't got it properly wet. It was a really wasted afternoon as the results did not help my bad temper!
I think if you use a really coarse wool for stuffing, it is unlikely to felt, even if the doll ends up with someone small who might give it a lot of loving, unless you machine wash it of course.
My bit of Jacob ended up as a much used cat bed, but it got progressively smaller as I pinched bits for cores for needlefelted stuff.