Needle Felted flowers from Alpaca fabric

These flowers are very easy to make and beginners will find the process simple. There are countless ways of embellishing the alpaca fabric that forms the base of the flower petals – whether you use one, two or three layers of petals. Consider the fashion possibilities – a flower made from the same fabric as your outfit or a scarf and flower from the same fabric.

Flowers may be used for your lapel or on a hat, and they may have their petals supported by florist’s wire, or remain soft.
The flower petals are best made from two layers – an essential lower layer of alpaca fabric and a top layer from a contrasting light fabric such as silk chiffon, or you can needle felt splashes of coloured fleece directly onto both sides of the alpaca fabric. You could also embellish the top side of the alpaca layer with cornelli embroidery using a single strand of Creswick Cornelli Yarn and the Creswick Needle Felting Tool. All embellishing of the alpaca fabric is done before the petals are cut out.

You will need:

Creswick Craft Alpaca 15cm wide fabric strip, Contrasting fabric, Creswick Craft Dyed Fleece or Cornelli Yarn
Creswick Craft Needle Felting Tool and brush, Stamens for the centre of your flower – from your craft shop, optional, Medium or lightweight florist’s wire – from your craft shop, optional, Pliers to cut wire, as needed

• Cut out the petal pattern and transfer it to firm cardboard. Using the needle felting tool, embellish sufficient of the alpaca fabric to cut out your required number of petal layers.

• If felting light-weight fabric onto alpaca, place the alpaca on top of the brush and spread the light fabric over it
right side up. Start needle felting at the closest edge to you and needle away from you up the centre, moving
to either side to secure and spread the light-weight fabric smoothly.

• If felting dyed fleece to the alpaca, tease out small portions of the fleece and spread it thinly over the alpaca,
mixing colours as you wish. Needle felt it into place being sure to do sufficient fabric to cut out your required
number of petal layers. Embellish the reverse side of the alpaca fabric in the same way.

• If needle felting cornelli embroidery to the alpaca, use the Creswick Crafts how-to sheet to create the
embroidery pattern onto sufficient fabric to cut your required number of petal layers.

• Cut out the required number of petal layers from your embellished fabric.

• If wiring your flower, fold each petal piece in half and cut a very small slit in the centre.

• Cut 12cm lengths of florist’s wire and thread one down the back of each petal, concealing them as much as
possible between the layers of fabric. Take the wire out through the slit to the back of the petal. The wires
should now go from the petal points, down each petal and out through the centre slit, the excess wire later
becoming part of the flower stem.

• Instead of florist’s wire you may be able to substitute excess wire from the ends of the stamens but make sure
each is long enough.

• Place the petals together, alternating the petals to fill spaces, carefully taking all stem wires down through the
centre split. Bend the stem wire sections to be at right angles to the petal wire sections.

• Push the stems of stamens down through the centre splits. Hold the stem wires and stamens together and bind
them with one of the outside stem wires. Cut wires to required length. Cut a strip of light fabric, or use teased
fleece, to bind the stem and secure with hand stitching.

• Bend the petal wires to have the petals curving up from the centre and outwards, perhaps with some turning up
at the ends slightly.

• If you decide to leave your flower petals embellished but soft, needle felt the centre of one petal layer so that it
becomes the focal point at the centre of the flower. Try using lengths of stranded Cornelli Yarn fixed only at one
end so that they can move. Place the petal layers together and hand stitch them together at the centre. Fix a
brooch fitting at the back, or simply hand stitch a medium sized safety pin in place.