Following the previous post on Rag Rugging, I liked the look of Hooking, which is like rugging in reverse.
I chose to use fleece fabric for this mat as it is light weight and does not fray. T-shirt material works well too. Fleece is harder to pull through the hessian than t-shirt material. Professionals use wool, old wool blankets are good, wool does not fray either, and the results are very refined.
The backing is hessian which I sewed around with a zig-zag stitch to neaten the edges. Some people cover the edges in colourful cotton on completion.
In rugging we thread small pieces of fabric through hessian, leaving the ends on the surface.
For hooking a one inch by ten inch strip of fleece is cut. The length of the strip is a personal preference.
The strip is rolled between the fingers so that no raw edge is showing.
With the strip underneath the hessian, put the crochet hook through the hessian and pull the fabric strip through the hessian to the front, forming a little ‘pebble’.
The first pebble is tricky as you often pull the end through to the front. Practice makes perfect.
In this picture you can see that the curled up ends are in the front of the piece. I decided I did not like this and spent quite a while when I had finished pulling them to the back and snipping the remains.
As an example the dark frame of this mat took half a metre of fleece fabric. So this is a great stash busting craft.
The finished item. It was intended to be a welcome mat on the boat. But the writing drove me nuts as half the time I was reading it upside down. Note to self, make mats bi-directional.
It is now on the small floor in the boat bedroom, and is lovely and cosy to step out onto.
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