Throwback Thursday - 2001 (Part 6)

In August of 2001 I completed a correspondence course in tassels. The purpose of the class was to learn to make a variety of tassels from various fiber, and decorate them using fiber and bead embellishments. It was quite a challenge! There are a total of 22 tassels, so I'll show them over four #throwbackthursday blog posts.

The first set are Conventional Tassels.


Simple Tassel with Multi-colored collar

The trick to a good simple tassel is learning to keep your head threads straight, your skirt threads combed and your collar heads wrapped tightly against one another. The ends of the collar threads are then hidden in the skirt.

This tassel was made with DMC perle coton #5. It's 3 inches long

Two Mini Tassels

The trick to these two mini tassels is that they were wrapped at the same time, then cut into two separate tassels. They were a little hard to control as they were being cut and tied because they are so small.

These tassels were made of stranded cotton floss. They are less than one inch long.

Tassel Used as a Scissors Fob

This is one of my very favorite tassels because of the simple thread I used. This main difference between this and the first tassel is the twisted cord made of the same fiber that's used to attach it to a pair of scissors

It's made from crochet cotton.

Pom Poms

I didn't automatically think of pom poms as a type of tassel, but they are! The secret to a great pom pom is to first wrap enough  yarn into a tassel, then to tie the head tight enough that the threads will pop into a spherical shape. The threads are then trimmed evenly for a balance ball appearance. If the pom pom isn't full, they are sad, sorry sights.

These pom poms were wrapped 200 times around a two inch cardboard. They are made from a basic 4-ply yarn. The finished size is approximately one inch in diameter.

Ribbon Tassel

This tiny ribbon tassel is another of my favorites. Satin ribbon tassels are used for decoration, but they don't hold up well if they're handled a lot.

The length of a ribbon tassel is determined by the width of the ribbon. The more narrow the ribbon, the shorter the tassel. Because the ribbon is satin, it was slippery and unruly to work with. The finished product is worth the trouble.

This ribbon is only 1/16" wide. The tassel is only 2 inches long. I decided to make the collar from cotton floss because it worked more easily than ribbon to wind around the top of the tassel.

My next #throwbackthursday post will show seven intricate tassels.