Felting woven wool

[Benning Boy]

I tried the washing machine method, and it sorta worked. Before washing the piece of fabric that prompted my original question had an open enough weave I could see through it if I covered my face with it. It is roughly the weight of kilt fabric. After washing I could still see through it, so it didn't really felt. It must have some synthetic fabric in it. I bought it to experiment with, and I can still do that, so not lose there.

When doing the washing I also threw in a remnant of a Pendelton wool blanket I bought to make a shoulder bag for carrying my outdoor stuff. Starting out the piece was big enough I could make a bag the size of a thing called the new invented haversack, a fairly large bag. Now it's the right size to make a Civil War sized haversack. I guess I won't be carrying a lot of junk. The blanket piece not only got smaller in the wash, it became thicker, more firm and felt like, so I'm convinced with the right fabric the washing machine method works fairly well.

I set my machine to wash in hot water, and run for the longest time, and used an extra amount of laundry soap, then dried on high heat.

I have some fairly large military surplus blankets I'd thought of washing, but given how much my test sample shrank, I won't be doing that.

[jhockin]

I used YouTube to search for info on this, to do a wee bit more felting, on a hand knitted Balmoral I bought from a member here, and it worked out quite well:

https://youtu.be/v4KTNIjc8wY