Mandy Nash’s creative spark was ignited by her grandmothers who passed on their traditional textile skills and ignited in her a passion for making colourful things. She studied jewellery design at Birmingham Polytechnic and the Royal College of Art but her work has been heavily influenced by traditional and contemporary textiles and in 2000 she discovered felt making . Mandy is a member and previous chairman of the International Felt Makers Association (IFA) and the regional co-ordinator for South Wales where she is based.
In 2019 Mandy was commissioned to write a book about Felt Bags and the project sparked a discussion at an IFA meeting about British Wool. As a result of those discussions the IFA approached a publisher to do a book about wool for felt making and in 2020 the project that became British Wool for Felt Making was born. On her second visit to our group Mandy talked about how they approached the task as there was no single author but a collaborative effort. Regional co-ordinators of the IFA worked via Zoom meetings during lockdown to establish the parameters and then went off to test different types of wool. When it comes to felting not all wools are equal and there are more than one hundred different breeds of sheep in the United Kingdom! Dozens of different types of wool were all tested in the same way and samples created to demonstrate how they responded to wet felting. It was astonishing how differently wools responded to the same treatment which clearly demonstrated the need to choose the most suitable varieties. The group also tested wools for needle felting and discovered that required different types of wool from wet felting.
Mandy then went on to talk about her favourite types of wool and how she uses different wools for different projects. Top of her list is the wool from Blue Faced Leicester sheep which is beautifully soft and produces a good drape. It also combines well with silk fibres. Black Welsh wool is good for rugs, bags and tea cosies with it’s thick and spongy fleece in a lovely shade of dark chocolaty brown. Next on her list is Manx Loagthtan an unusual breed that does not require shearing as it sheds its fleece naturally. It has good natural colour and soft texture. Shetland is also a great favourite with it’s lovely range of natural colours and soft but firm texture which is very good for making garments. Lincoln Longwool is the proverbial Rasta Sheep with long dreadlocks whose wool though quite coarse can produce a good lacy effect felt. And last on Mandy’s top favourites is the Swaledale with it’s coarse strong wool that is perfect for slippers, bags and rugs especially when combined with Shetland wool.
Mandy went on to describe how uncarded or unprocessed wool can be used to create different textures including the classical sheepskin rug made by felting the back of the fleece and leaving the front looking woolly! She encourages people to use their local wools or different fleeces in combination to produce different looks and textures and exploit the natural colours found in wool. On display were examples of felting done using different varieties of wool all treated exactly the same way and it was illuminating to observe how differently they responded to the same felting techniques. The shrinkage factor for each individual breed is remarkably different and one needs to experiment if you want a specific size.
