Sue Pearl, vibrant felt maker, artist and author of the new book, ‘Making Felted Friends’, was recently in Australia where she took time out to speak to ‘get creative’ about 500-year-old farmhouses, making Nuno, teaching and felting on the international stage.

Sue’s website describes her as “a felt maker making felt art pieces for craft galleries and running felt making workshops in schools and in adult education centres” but this somehow downplays the scope of work this artist undertakes. At the age of 60 the ex-interior designer is surfing the wave of a new and burgeoning career that came about through seemingly negative events.

“In my previous life I had an interior design business, I was used to writing specifications for builders and laying everything out clearly,” she says. The recession in the 1990s saw Sue’s once thriving business go under and, she says, after 25 years in the field of architecture, she realised she’d lost heart for the industry.

“So, you pick yourself up and dust yourself off,” as she says, “and I went back to college and studied textiles instead.” Already a hobbyist spinner and weaver, Sue took what is called a City and Guilds course in constructed textiles then worked towards a diploma in weaving, spinning and dyeing from Bradford University. She wanted to research more so studied for an MA at London Guildhall University where, in 1997, she was awarded with a Distinction.

Clearly a woman with innate creative talent, Sue’s years in the design business have also contributed to her success in this new field. One look at her website shows you’re dealing with an artistic professional. Early on in her career Sue’s work was travelling in exhibitions and, on one of these first forays, she was asked by a Gallery Director if she could work with a special needs school nearby.

From there a formidable teaching schedule developed and, Sue says, she discovered she “loved” this side of things and now runs workshops from her Cotswold farmhouse studio and all over the UK on topics such as basic felt making, dealing with special effects and materials, bag making, Nuno, hat making and more.

“I found I loved giving people my ideas and seeing where they take them,” says Sue. “I’m giving the basics but it’s about their interpretation and that’s the exciting part... I suppose I am serious about what I do but I think you have to be for other people to take you seriously... It’s true I’m proactive and like to push myself.”

After a trip to visit her daughter and family in Sydney in recent years she returned to her 500-year-old home to a letter from a company asking if she’d be interested in producing projects and instructions for a book based on her felted creatures.

“Would I be interested? Of course I said yes,” declares Sue who seems to say an enthusiastic “yes” to all new challenges put in her path; an approach that is definitely paying off. “It took the best part of a year to put the book together - I made all the projects step by step as the camera shot them - and it was hard work at times but I loved it. My experience in the building trade helped me a lot I think. I’m good at making sure every step is covered.”

Some elements of her new career required adaptations. After all, Sue was used to being surrounded by staff in her office and, later, fellow students while she studied. As a felt maker she often has stretches of time alone in her studio and says teaching brings her the balance she needs, the company she enjoys.

“I wish I could be a bit more disciplined and 9am to 5pm in my approach to work,” she says, “but I really work best under a deadline. I go through phases. Sometimes I might spend a week doing nothing but designing, another week I’ll be dying wool.”

She is invited by different craft groups to give talks and she runs anywhere up to three workshops a month from her own premises. She loves to accept invitations from Women’s Institute members (similar to our Country Women’s Association) but stipulates that a “nice piece of homemade cake” must be part of her reward.  Sue also works in schools as an artist in residence and maintains her work in the special needs field where she began.

The “critters” that form the core of ‘Making Felted Friends’ (published by Storey Publishing and distributed in Australia by Keith Ainsworth) are distinctive and full of character. You expect them to open their mouths and speak. In Australia the creatures are available from The Bay Tree at 40 Queens Street, Woollahra, NSW (see www.thebaytree.com.au [thebaytree.com.au]). Sue is also planning on “getting into” sock toys and a new website will be appearing, probably called Planet Socks, and product will, once again, be available from the Woollahra retailer. At Sue’s main site - www.feltbetter.com [feltbetter.com] - one finds a shopping page, links to the ‘Felt Magic’ DVD she’s produced, not to mention free instructions, a gallery of her work and updates on workshops.

With a grandchild in Sydney now, Sue plans to return to Australia again and again and says she’d “love to teach” here and in New Zealand. “What can I say? I lead a charmed life,” she says. We concur.

Name
Sue Pearl

Based
Oxfordshire, United Kingdom

Website
www.feltbetter.com [feltbetter.com]

Email
sue@feltbetter.com

Share your work overseas
Sue Pearl is also Publicity Officer of the International Feltmakers Association (“with lots of Australian and New Zealand  members”).

Visit the website:
Go to www.feltmakers.com [feltmakers.com] where you can join online and receive copies, four times a year, of the group’s magazine called ‘Felt Matters’ plus receive updates on the annual exhibitions and the AGM and workshop program, not to mention take part in forums, expand your skill base and share your work.

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