Felted Slippers Pattern:
An Eco-Friendly Gift to Make From Old, Wool Sweaters

Every year, I make my mother-in-law slippers and have found that felted slippers are the most durable kind to give. In the past, I have always knit the slippers first and then felted them after. This year, however, time is proving to be a bit of an issue, so I struck out to make an inexpensive, homemade gift that wouldn't cost me too much time.

Rather than knitting these slippers, I looked for wool sweaters that I could felt, cut up and sew together. The results? A snug, cozy and warm pair of wool slippers that only took me an evening to put together and cost less than knitting a pair - now that's my kind of gift making!

Materials Needed

- one wool cardigan (a button-up sweater), felted
- two pieces of computer paper
- a marker
- scissors
- pins
- tapestry needle
- scrap yarn in a coordinating colour



Felted Slippers: Finding the Sweaters

Search your local thrift stores for wool sweaters. Look at the tags and only buy sweaters that are made from 80% or more wool.

Sweaters made from thin yarn felt up to a lighter weight fabric, whereas those knit from thick yarn felt up to a heavier weight fabric. You want your slippers to be durable, so try to find sweaters that were made with thick yarn.

Felted Slippers: Felting the Sweaters

To be technical, we are actually fulling the sweater, but since everyone these days calls it felting, so shall we.

Place 2 or 3 sweaters in the washing machine. If you only have one sweater to felt, throw in a couple pairs of jeans as well so that the sweater has something to rub against...you need lots of friction for felting.

Machine wash the sweater in hot water and let it agitate...I found agitating the sweater for 15 minutes gave the desired effect. Let the washing machine spin out the water and remove the sweater before the rinse cycle begins.

You can then either lay the sweater flat to dry, or you can put it in the dryer. The sweater will continue to felt up in the dryer, so if you don't want anymore felting, it's best to let it air dry.

Felted Slippers: The Pattern

Once your sweater is dry, you can start making your felted slippers.

For the sole pieces:

(My mother-in-law and I have feet that are almost the same size, so I don't have much of a sizing issue for this pattern. If you don't have the same size of feet as the person you're making these wool slippers for, find someone who does. Or, find out their shoe size and use this information to do an internet search to find out the length of the giftee's foot.)

First, trace one of your feet onto a piece of computer paper.

Draw an oval-ish shape that is as long as your foot, 1/4" wider than the sides of your foot and that tapers down towards your heel. See photo below for clarification.

For the upper pieces:

Trace your foot again. Now draw a curved line 1/4" away from your toes. Once you get to the little toe, draw a line straight down to your heel. Repeat for the other side of the foot.

Draw and cut out a rectangular piece from the middle of your pattern. This rectangular piece should be 1" away from the sides of your pattern piece and should only go 2/3rds up the foot. For the sake of comfort, your rectangle should be narrower at the bottom of the foot...this is where your heel will be, so you want to have a bit more fabric there. See photo below for more clarification:

Using a marker, trace one of each pattern piece onto the wrong side of your felted sweater. Now, flip your pattern pieces over and trace one more of each. (You flip over the pattern pieces so that you can make the parts needed for your opposite foot).

Cut out all of your pieces.

With wrong sides together, place one upper piece of your slipper on top of one of your sole pieces. Pin in place. Carefully put the slippers on and see if you need to make any adjustments.

You can see that in order for the slipper to feel snug around my foot, I had to shorten the sides and pin them in place. I then trimmed off the excess fabric/wool. I also trimmed off about 1/4" from the heel portion (following the curve as I cut so that I kept the rounded shape).

If you are making these felted slippers for someone without your foot size, I think you can safely trim off 1/4" of an inch from either side strip and about 1/4" off the back of the heel. Even if your slippers are a bit small, felted wool still stretches significantly.

Here's a picture of my slipper trimmed, pinned and ready to be sewn together.

With your tapestry needle and some scrap yarn, start along the sides of your slippers and use a blanket stitch to sew your felted pieces together.

To make a blanket stitch, bring your needle up through the bottom of your work to the top. Make sure the yarn is behind the needle and pull tight.

When you reach the center-heel of your slippers, pause to sew the ends of your two side pieces together by making a decorative 'x' shaped stitch all the way up the heel. The seam of your heel should be right in the middle of your 'x' stitches. Once the heel is sewn up, you can finish sewing your two slipper pieces together.

Next, cut off the button band of your sweater so that it is about 1" shorter than the length around the foot opening of your felted slipper.

With right sides facing, use a back stitch tosew the button band onto the edge of the opening for the foot.

IMPORTANT:Make sure that you really pull the button band tight so that it is stretched out as you stitch. This will make sure that there is tension in the button band and that it will fit snugly around your foot. Nothing's worse than a slipper that is saggy and loose around the top.

Once you are done sewing on the button band, you can trim off any excess length and sew the ends together. You can then sew the button holes closed, or leave them open, as I did. My mother-in-law loves things that tell a story, and I knew she'd like a visual reminder that these slippers had once been a hand knit fair-isle sweater.

If you're feeling saucy, decorate your slippers with the buttons left over from your sweater.

Try to take a few photos of your finished product (but maybe wait until the kids are down for a nap).

I hope the person you give them to enjoys their pair of toasty felted slippers. I know I'm going to have a hard time giving this pair away!

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