Book Review: Making Flowers from Wool by Nan Loncharich

As a gal who started out in Floral Design I was really excited when I got this book to review. I. LOVE. FLOWERS!!

AND as an extra bonus I’ve been collecting wool here and there when I’m out on my thrift store jaunts. I haven’t really done much with any of it so I was super excited about finding a new way to use what I have.

Perfect!

A few things you might want to know about this book:

Soft cover
76 pages
There are six chapters in the first part of the book covering everything from Fabrics, Supplies, Basic Flowers, Leaves, Accent Flowers and How to Make Pins in the first 27 pages of the book. The remainder is a Flower Gallery.
The MSRP is $14.95 (USD) and can be purchased for $10.76 at amazon.com here.

The first section of the book is called Techniques but it covers more than just techniques. Fabrics and supplies are covered as well as techniques for making all kinds of flowers and leaves.

At first I was a little disappointed to find that the book includes no real patterns.

Until I picked up some wool and just started cutting. It’s sort of a free form intuitive process. And more fun than tracing and cutting a pattern, I think.

Why be stuck making flowers the way someone else sees them when you can make them any way you wish?

So I started flipping through the book to find a project that I could make. As I said, there are no patterns so I was just looking for a little inspiration to get me started.

I also love vintage buttons so this particular flower caught my eye.

Now to dig through my stash to see what I have on hand.

Â And this was what I came up with. I used wool from an old wool suit dress I made years and years ago plus wool from the thrift shop and vintage buttons from my stash.

Not bad at all for a first try. It was pretty easy, fun and quick to make up. All in all, a good craft in my book.

A tip from me to you: Start out cutting your flower bigger than you intend for it to be and then you can trim it down once you get your basic shape going. It just gives you more room to “play” with the design.

Now that I’ve kind of got the bug I’ll have to see what else I can make!

Disclosure: sample provided for review.