FeltCrafts and Craft Works Publishing were created by Anne Einset Vickrey, an internationally recognized author and designer. Ms. Einset-Vickrey comes from a family with a tradition of handcrafts. Her Norwegian grandmother was an avid sewer and embroiderer. She started Anne's interest in crafts when she taught her how to embroider at age 12, when Anne was visiting her in Stavanger, Norway. Anne has spent the last twenty years involved with felt making; researching, writing, publishing and designing.

As a teenager Anne attended Hardanger Folk High School (Folkehogskule) in Lofthus, Hardanger, Norway and learned weaving. Her interest in fiber arts and other crafts continued through college in Vermont where she took courses in weaving, pottery and sculpture although her major was in foods and nutrition. While attending a dietetic internship in Portland, Oregon, she purchased her first weaving loom. After receiving a Master's Degree in nutritional sciences from Cornell University, Anne moved to Menlo Park, California with her husband Jim.

In January 1982, when her first child, Becky, was two years old, Anne learned Scandinavian felt making from Anna-Lise S. Jorgensen, the wife of a visiting Danish scientist who worked in the same lab as her husband at SRI International. Together they made a pair of child-size felt slippers. Her next project, attempted on her own, was a pair of slippers for her sister-in-law. She brought the finished slippers to the Black Sheep Hand Weavers Guild meeting in Palo Alto. Most members had never seen handmade felt and many were eager to learn more about it. This interest led to her teaching workshops to area guilds and fiber arts groups and demonstrating at weaving and sheep and wool and angora rabbit shows. (See section on the "Early challenges to teaching Feltmaking") Early workshops were difficult because there was little information available on the types of wool that were suitable for feltmaking. She researched felting qualities of sheep breeds available to her through local growers, and gathered these notes in a workshop instruction booklet. Her workshop instruction notes turned into a spiral bound booklet (1984) which she sold with wool as a felting kit. In 1987 she formed a publishing company, Craft Works Publishing. Her first self-published book, Felting By Hand, is now in it's sixth printing. Anne also contributed articles to the Northern California Angora Guild's Angora Rabbit Handbook. In 1985 Anne began work on her first magazine article on felt making with Sunset Magazine in Menlo Park. The article was published in the 1987 and titled "Sheep on Your Feet".

Anne first became involved with the Waldorf Schools when friends in her babysitting co-op formed a Waldorf School in the Menlo Park area in the mid-eighties. They asked if she would have a table with handmade felt at the fundraising festival. Feltmaking fit with the Waldorf philosophy and school store managers encouraged her to design more kits that were sold in Waldorf school stores. In 1988 her son, John, started in Parent's Nursery School in Palo Alto. Anne wanted to bring a felt-making project for the 2 and 3-year-old children to do. John, who was 3, was playing with some colored wool on the kitchen table, wetting his hands and rolling the wool between them. His 7-year-old sister Becky saw that he had made a felt rope and said "We can make this into a necklace!" Cutting the rope into pieces turned them into felt beads and threading them on wool yarn made a necklace. This easy project was a big hit at nursery school and the teacher, Virginia, even wore her felt bead necklace to the symphony! That was the beginning of the FeltCrafts line of felt-making kits. The first necklace kits were introduced in 1990.

Anne continued to design projects for children, developing new techniques. In 1990 she had two articles published in Threads magazine: "Hand Felted Jackets for Kids", and "Surface Design on Hand Made Felt" co-authored with Karen Livingstone. In the first article, Anne gives instructions for making a small seamless jacket. In the second article she worked with Karen Livingstone, a friend and professional fabric dyer. They dyed hand felted jackets using various dye techniques including, shibori, fold and clamp, discharge, dip dying and block printing with pigments.

In 1991 Anne worked with Victorian Videos Productions on two felt making videos: Felt making: The Basic Process, and Felt-making: Garments and Surface Design Techniques. The first video gives an overview of felt making and the steps for making a hat. The second video expands on the technique for making a seamless jacket, giving techniques for making an adult size. Surface design techniques demonstrated include wet, dry and soft felt inlay; fabric inlay, and cutting into the felt.

In 1995, Anne decided to launch a marketing campaign for her FeltCrafts kits. She had her first booth at the HIA (Hobby Industry of America) trade show in Anaheim, California. She continued to show at the HIA trade show for the next three years. It was her participation at these shows that led to her television appearances, and her book contract with Watson-Guptill Publications for her book "The Art of Feltmaking" published in 1997. She appeared on "The Carol Duvall Show" on HGTV in the fall of 1996 and on "Home Matters" in the spring of 1997. "The Carol Duvall Show" segment has aired annually. FeltCrafts Kits have also been shown on "Aleene's Creative Living" on TNN, and on the "Home Show".

In 1997, Anne moved her company to Geneva, NY. At that time she had a line of eight FeltCrafts(r) kits. During the next three years she increased her line to over thirty-five kits. In 1999 the marketing strategy for the company changed with the kits being marketed primarily to the specialty toy industry and museum stores in addition to exclusives offered to catalogs. In the fall of 1999 FeltCrafts(r) Little Felt People Kit received a Parents Choice Gold Award. Anne continues to promote the craft of feltmaking, designing and marketing new kits and keeping up with the new techniques and materials that are continually evolving in the field.

Waldorf Schools

If you read our section about the history of FeltCrafts, you will see that we have been involved in providing natural craft kits to Waldorf Schools for nearly 17 years. Many of our feltmaking kits have been inspired by suggestions from Waldorf School shop managers and parents.

Our feltmaking kits are available in many Waldorf School stores, Waldorf oriented catalogs such as HearthSong, Magic Cabin Dolls and Creative Hands. Many Waldorf oriented websites carry our kits including: Waldorfshop.net/feltcrafts, RosieHippo.com, and NaturalPlay.com.

If you are the manager of a Waldorf School store or would like to order our products for a school fundraiser or festival, call 1-800-450-2723 or send an email with your address so we can mail you the information.

A new craft technique that is gaining popularity among felt makers is dry felting or needle felting. Needle felting is a lot of fun and a great way to make three-dimensional dolls and animals using wool fleece. Felting needles can also be used on wet felted projects to get more detail than you can normally get with only wet felting. Needle felting is appropriate for parents and teenagers because of the sharp needles used. Children eight and up can do needle felting with close supervision by an adult. Contact us for information on our new needle felting supplies and instructions.