Several months ago I treated myself to Birgitte Krag Hansen’s latest book on the art of Needle Felting.... English translation.... “Pixie Felt”. I decided I really liked the way Birgitte added colour to her faces and I loved the way she positioned the eye to make the pixies looking ‘out of the corner of their eye’, thus giving them a quizzical look. I really wanted to try and achieve more depth of hue in my needle felted faces too. I gathered many shades of skin tones in coarse fleece (Corriedale and Romney) and laid them all out in front of me before beginning. I decided I’d work on a bigger face as it would give me more room to play with colour. So what began as a simple experiment turned out to have quite a ‘wow factor’!

First of all, the heads were made on a wool batte cone (core fibre) from which I intended to sculpt the features. The bottom of the cone was going to make a base for the head to rest on, and the top of the cone was to form the hat. I discovered that to make the colour of the wool more subtle, I needed to lay the darker tones down first and then apply the lighter tones on top. The less I placed on top, the darker the outcome was; this resulted in a delightful shading effect, which was quite pleasing. Doing the eyes was also fantastic, as the placement of the iris in the corner of the eye socket, changed the expression completely. I also discovered that if I put the highlight into the eye with a strand of pearl cotton with a doll needle and tied it to the back of the head, then it didn’t fuzz out and fade over time. A white wool highlight, over time, would “fluff” into the eye causing the highlight to loose its intensity. The pearl cotton retained the ‘glint’ which I found so pleasing!

As I was beginning my overseas travels, I decided to take the makings of another pixie along with me to work on, when I had some spare time. Because the heads were about 5” in height I could make more detailed hands. I made the hands with four tubes, bound together with a batte. Then added another fifth tube where the thumb should be. I ran out of all my materials at this stage, during my travels, so could go no further until I got back home.

I had originally intended on doing bodies even though they would be quite big. If I was to complete them, the bodies would need to be about 30” to maintain the size dimension. However what was a “work in progress” has now become completed as the heads and hands have found “their bodies” in a variety of natural objects around the home. Here they are hiding in the palm roots in the Rainforests in Queensland. There they are in the Old Growth Forests of B.C. playing peek-a-boo in the hedge. They are presently hiding on top of my fridge, looking at me as I peer into its depths on a daily basis. The illusion is complete wherever they are placed!

I have envisioned bringing them back to Canada next year, and making a big grapevine, Christmas theme wreath, and hiding the pixies in amongst the foliage and greenery. Touches of artificial snow would look good too.

— Jenny Romano