The making of a horse

I thought it might be fun and interesting to take pictures of one of my projects from start to finish. This is a needle felted horse.

First I arrange pipecleaners in a rough 'skeleton.' I wrap the leg pipe cleaners around the body/neck pipecleaners. Then, I tie each strand of embroidery floss to the skeleton so they can't come undone. Not much is worse than having your doll's hair fall out!!!



Then I wrap the skeleton with roving and tack it down with the three-needle felting needle pen, This helps hold the skeleton together.



Now I just continue adding more and more and more roving, trying to stick with the rough anatomy of the horse. The roving will compress a LOT, so I don't worry about some areas being too thick or thin.



Then I just keep adding more and more roving and packing it in. It's still too fluffy, and the anatomy is still a bit off, so I keep refining as I add more and more roving.



I like to make the horse nice and firm, so it's less likely to unfelt or become mishappen as it's played with. I add more roving to areas that are a little too thin or too fluffy. And just keep felting and felting. About 4 or 5 hours after the last picture, I've arrived at this state.



Another view--I still need to trim the hair so there's no more loops and the hair is more even.



Here's a view of the face--does it look okay? I don't like putting eyes because they always seem to have weird expressions or look creepy to me...



And a top view

That looks great!

Face looks fine to me!  Eyes always look "different" on models or toys, creeps me out two 🤣

I have a friend making metal framed woven horses I will try and get a photo this weekend if you are interested?

Beautiful work!  I truly admire the patience this craft requires.

That is just beautiful.

Thank you so much, for sharing this, Nicole! Beautiful work! 😍😍😍

I'm so glad it looks good! I tend to get second-thoughts about my creations and start finding/imagining flaws.

Thank you all! ♥

Toby Ornot wrote:That looks great!

Face looks fine to me!  Eyes always look "different" on models or toys, creeps me out two 🤣

I have a friend making metal framed woven horses I will try and get a photo this weekend if you are interested?

I'd love to see pictures! It's so neat to see all the different ways people can make so many different things!

Nicole Alderman wrote:

Toby Ornot wrote:That looks great!

Face looks fine to me!  Eyes always look "different" on models or toys, creeps me out two 🤣

I have a friend making metal framed woven horses I will try and get a photo this weekend if you are interested?

I'd love to see pictures! It's so neat to see all the different ways people can make so many different things!

I will get some this weekend for you :)

Great job!  I like the way you tied the mane and tail to the frame to start, that's brilliant.  Had I tried doing it, I'm sure there would have been a quandary at the end, trying to figure out how to get them to stick on.

Niele da Kine wrote: Great job!  I like the way you tied the mane and tail to the frame to start, that's brilliant.  Had I tried doing it, I'm sure there would have been a quandary at the end, trying to figure out how to get them to stick on.

I had quite a few dolls that had their hair come out when I was a kid, and it was one of the first things on my mind! Tying it seemed like the best option.




I just realized I had a picture of it all finished and ready to ship out! What better packaging material that old seed catalog pages, am I right?

That's soooo beautiful, Nicole! Nice work! How much do you charge for one? Do you ever make animals that need whiskers? I have had many cats all my life & they naturally lose one or two whiskers a month around the full moon & I can't resist saving them as I have noticed toys or sculptures that add fake whiskers I they always look funny to me. As I am in my 50's I now have many whiskers & haven't made any animal toys or sculpture, so I literally have hundreds. I also make Herkimet diamond jewelry in sterling silver, would you possibly be interested in trading?

So beautiful!  I might have a hard time parting with her if I was you!!!