FROME Writers’ Collective (FWC) have warmly welcomed a new member to the group, Roz Dace, who put pen to paper on the award-winning ‘Needle Felting for Beginners’, which won best craft book in The Craft Business Awards 2021.
Roz moved to Frome last year, and together with her sister Judy, they are the authors of several craft books. Their latest title, ‘Needle Felting Dolls: a complete course in sculpting figures’, was published in January of this year.
The group say, “Roz’s previous career was with a leading art and craft publisher, Search Press, where she was responsible for researching and commissioning craftspeople and artists to write instruction books for others to learn new skills. She has tried out many of the crafts over the years and when she retired decided she would like to write guides for the company herself.
“After looking for a suitable gap in the market, she and her sister decided to focus on the art of needle felting. They formed a partnership – the ‘Woolly Felters’ – to develop new ‘characters’, write ‘how to’ guides and produce kits for beginners. Their books regularly top the craft books charts and are popular all over the world, especially in the USA.
“While traditional ‘wet felting’ is thousands of years old, ‘dry’ or needle felting was developed in the 1980s and requires no equipment other than a couple of felting needles and a supply of special coarse wool. Since starting out, Roz and Judy have produced their own ‘Felty Towers’ world, inhabited by a quirky collection of human and animal characters, and they love to use these in storytelling.
“Roz will be talking about her work in an interview for FWC’s Writers on Radio programme, to be broadcast on FromeFM from 2-3pm on Friday February 3 on 96.6 FM (and also available as a podcast).
“Producing craft books is very much a collaborative process. Roz storyboards the making process for each of the projects and works with photographers to produce the illustrations for the informative step-by-step guides.”
Examples of the sisters’ work can be seen at www.woollyfelters.com
If you would like to join FWC, email fromewriterscollective @gmail.com
