DIY Abstract Rainbow Fiber Art

This Art idea came was really inspired by the works of Natalie Miller. I loved the abstract patterns and colors she uses in her weavings, but I wanted a simplified version that I could create without actually having to weave.

I started by digging through my craft supplies and laying out all the rainbow yarn I had. Then I cut a piece of sheeting fabric that would be the background I could attach the yarn to. The fabric piece I used was 4′ x 3′.

If you were to recreate one the same this you will need about 12-15 skeins of yarn. This cost me barely anything since my mom has tons of yarn, but if you are buying yarn budget about $4 per yarn ball. Micheals has great color options and usually has sales on too.

Once I had the rough color pattern decided on, I stretched a piece of yarn that was a bit longer than my background fabric across the knobs on my desk and started tying loops of yarn that were about 12″ in length. This worked out conveniently having my desk like this but if you don’t have something similar you can stretch the yarn between two chairs to give you a space to tie the loops. And if a video is more your speed I have this process saved in my highlights under “Fiber Art” on my Instagram profile.

Once I had the whole row tied in loops I would lay it down on the background fabric and sew it in place to prevent sagging, using a simple quilting stitch. Doing this row by row helped me arrange the yarn lengths as I went.

Here is a view of the back of the fabric where you can see each row secured with knots.

And here is the other side showing the rough pattern all secured to the background. The colors and texture of it all together make me sooo happy!

To finish it off I stapled the fabric to a nice piece of 1/4″ maple.

Some of the fabric was still sticking up so I used some hot glue to fold it back and glue it in place so it wouldn’t stick up above the wood.

Next, I attached a couple of picture-hanging hooks and got it up on the wall. I brushed out the yarn a bit and then gave it a nice trim to clean up all the edges.

After the first trim, there were still quite a few curly yarn pieces so I ran my steamer over it and smoothed everything out, and then gave it one more trim.