Needle Felting Halloween Decoration

Usher Art Gallery is hosting a needle felting workshop on Thursday 29 October, just ten days before Halloween. The session runs from 13:00 to 15:30 in the Clore Learning room, so it's a mid-afternoon thing rather than a whole day.

If you've never come across it, needle felting is a bit of a tactile process. You take loose wool—carded wool, as it's called—and use a special barbed needle to poke and sculpt it into shape. The barbs catch the fibres and tangle them together, so the more you poke, the firmer the piece becomes. Over the course of the afternoon, you'll be working your way from a handful of loose wool to a finished Halloween decoration you can actually keep and bring out again next year.

It's a good one to do if you're into the making side of things. You don't need to be an expert to get something decent out of it, and because it's a workshop, you'll have someone on hand to show you how to handle the needles and build up your shape. It's the kind of thing that's quite satisfying to watch come together—starting with a soft cloud of wool and ending up with something you can hold in your hand.

The workshop is held at the Usher Art Gallery in Lincoln, specifically in the Clore Learning room, and it costs £15. It runs from 13:00 to 15:30 on Thursday 29 October, so you'll be sorted with your own handmade decoration well before the big night.