Sunday, April 11, 2010

Felted Soap Tutorial


Gather just a few inexpensive materials to make a lovely personal bar of felted soap.

You will need ¼ oz of wool roving, a bar of soap and a nylon knee high stocking. I use Dove soap it has a nice scent and lasts a long time.


Step 1) Divide your wool into 4 equal parts. Step 2) Feather out each piece of wool so it is at least as wide as the soap is long.

Step 3) Wrap one piece of the wool firmly around the soap vertically, wrap the second piece around horizontally, repeat with the 3rd and 4th pieces of wool.

Step 4) Place soap in the toe of the nylon and twist the nylon gently.
Step 5) Hold the soap under warm running water and gently squeeze the water through to the soap, after you feel that the soap is saturated with water you can add water as needed. Do this for about 2 minutes gradually increasing the pressure. After the 2 minutes you can now start to rub, starting very gently again increasing pressure for 4 minutes, if you go to fast you will make folds in the wool and it will not look as nice. You will start to see bits of wool coming through the nylon, you are about done, pull the nylon back and peek at the soap to see if the wool has turned into fabric. You can remove the wool covered soap from the nylon at this point but if you think it needs a bit more work you can put it back in the nylon and continue to rub until it is felted to your satisfaction.
Step 6) Dry the felted soap by squeezing it in a dry hand towel, then place on a cookie cooling rack to dry over night.

Step 7) Package your soap in an attractive cello bag or tie a ribbon around it, you could even place it in a box. This little bar of felted soap makes a pretty nice gift.

After you master the soap you can move on to bigger projects like this fun little hat, modeled by my granddaughter Savannah.

*If you find a problem and need help please leave a comment and I will reply on the same comment page, have fun and make some felted soap.

4 comments:

Dreamcicle Journeys said...

Thanks, Tory, for sharing how you make your felted soap bars- it looks like a great rainy day project.

Dayna Collins said...

Thank you for sharing such detailed instructions on how to make felted soap. I've done it a couple of times, but I always seem to forget some of the details!

artfromhome said...

Thanks Tory.
Question about the hat: Did you make it around something round or does it have a seam?
I started to make a hat but couldn't get the nylon over the roving covered balloon. Can you give me some help?
---Judi

Tory Brokenshire said...

Hi Judi, I made the hat on a piece of cardboard, you put roving on both sides. You really need 2 people to pull the nylon over the balloon. Hope that helps.