With this simple tutorial on creation of... no, most likely, on updating an old stole, I begin to acquaint you, my dear needlewomen, with the basics of various techniques and methods for creating and decorating clothes and accessories...

Today we will focus on felting of decorative elements — a dot stole for the coat, which was felted some time ago, I gently sewed two rows of buttons to it and got a double-breasted product. This product must be supported by an accessory. What accessory? What to make it of? To answer this question, as always, you must start with the samples... Frankly, I tried a lot: all kinds of "holey" texture, I felted different types of silk, made yarn decorations: the one that is at the bottom of the sleeves... I didn't like anything! Everything was kind of heavy... But the coat is lightweight, with short sleeves, and hence a stole should make the feeling of something easy, not congested and clearly not "wintery"... So the coat continued to hang...

But in the end I bought a plain Italian stole of a complex beige color, which had a number of useful properties:

- A "calm" color, which perfectly matches the main product.

- Mesh plain weave (the structure looked a little like very high quality cheesecloth, but with the addition of silk).

- The composition is, most likely, blended fabric, very soft with a slight noble shine.

- The fabric contains natural fibers. It was clear if you looked at the edge of the stole: it was clear that the fabric is hand painted (those who paint fabrics know what the edge of the hand-dyeing natural fabrics has "creases" that add some beauty and texture).There were considerable advantages of my purchase!

Dear artisans, be careful when choosing materials, look for them thoroughly, experiment! Try on simple things, do not just use them on complex projects at once! You should get not only a beautiful thing, but a quality hand-made thing, carefully executed...

Then, as they say, it is paperwork.

1. Prepare a finest prefelt: divide a ley of Italian wool 18-19 microns to 4 parts, strengthen the edge of our future cloth around the perimeter (the 1st row) and begin the layout. For the stability of the felted cloth I made the 1st layer vertical and the 2st layer horizontal, next, I decorated it with viscose and silk fibers of matching colors (I didn't lay it evenly — I wanted to get a variety of textures).

2. Cut the yarn to "dots".

3. Now these dots are randomly spread on the top of the cloth (not dense) and cover the top of each dot with the finest wool (as web), it is necessary to felt our dots strongly, as there is no wool in their composition!

4. Now, as usual, cover with a mesh, spray some water with soap: the air must leave and all the layers should be evenly impregnated with soapy water. We carefully slightly press the cloth using the mesh with vertical movements. At this stage I slightly sponge the excess water if necessary. We are mindful of the principle of even wetting...

5. Gently remove the mesh with a vertical movement.

6. Process the product with a grinding machine through bubble film (the film is laid with the smooth side to the machine, to the top). Attention: do not iron with a machine, just put it vertically for 5 seconds, then vertically lift it and put to another place in the same way. Our task at this stage is to make a prefelt, but not to felt, then remove the excess water through the mesh or add some soapy water... I process the product with a machine for a second time with the same short intervals.

7. My prefelt is ready: the felt has already grappled and the balls of yarn don't come off, but the cloth has not began to shrink yet! I took a template (in my case it is a mug), the circle was chosen given the fact that future circles would be shrank (it is necessary to choose the diameter taking into account the shrink factor).

8. Now carefully cut out the circles.

9. Wet our ready stole, wring out the water, lay the stole on a table and put our beautiful circles on it, close them with mesh, again add some soapy water, slightly lapping each circle to the fabric, remove the mesh and you can process each circle with a machine, then felt all our stole very carefully and as usual...

Next part: https://www.livemaster.com/topic/3013139-how-to-make-a-simple-stole-striking-part-2-felting