Full of It: 6 Ways to Rough-Finish Handspun Yarn

You might have a default spin, but do you have a default wet-finishing method? If you’re a new spinner, you might know that you need to wet-finish your yarn, but feel stumped as to how. Kate Larson’s course Finishing Up: How to Wash, Block, Dry and Finish Handspun Yarns is a great place to start if you’re completely new to wet-finishing your yarn.

How you wet-finish depends on the yarn you’ve spun and how you plan to use it. For knits, I tend to reach for a mild wash followed by an aggressive thwack, but was recently drawn to even more extreme wet-finishing methods. From mildly fuzzy to totally fulled, there are many ways to rough-finish your yarn. If you’re working with wool that will felt, fulling is an excellent way to smooth out spinning inconsistencies—especially in woolen-spun yarn—and make your yarn more durable for hard-wearing projects like socks. As wool fulls, it becomes less likely to pill, which makes it great for other projects that are likely to see lots of abrasion, like sweaters.

For this post, I wanted to explore some of those more extreme methods. I figured there wouldn’t be much difference between the six I chose, but found myself surprised by the variety of results!

Felt or Full?

While often used interchangeably, the words felt and full refer to two different things. Felting occurs when unspun fibers mat together, creating an unwoven cloth known as felt. Fulling occurs when spun yarn or fabric goes through the same process.

In both processes, heat, moisture, and agitation combine to make the fibers lock together. Soap reduces surface tension and speeds up the process. Fabric and yarns shrink, sometimes in surprising ways. While many fibers can felt or full, we often talk about it in connection with wool, because the scales of wool fibers lock together so readily.

Will it Full?

Most non-superwash wool fibers will full. Some breeds, like Merino, are notoriously eager to full, while others, like Southdown, stubbornly resist it. I’ve even found that superwash wool will full about 10% when put in the dryer on high heat.

For this article, I chose a dyed Corriedale braid from my stash. While most Corriedale doesn’t full quite as readily as most Merino, it still fulls easily enough when subjected to each of the processes listed below. I spun all singles to about 24 wraps per inch (wpi) with a supported longdraw, then made a two-ply that was about 12 wpi before wet-finishing.

Pamela used a dyed Corriedale braid for her samples.

How Much Should You Full?

How aggressively you full your yarn is entirely up to you! It’s not always necessary to full your yarn—in fact, weavers gently set their twist and save the fulling step for after weaving. For knit and crochet projects, fulling can change the structure of your yarn in interesting and sometimes useful ways. If you want to try it, I’ve laid out six different methods so you can choose what works for you.

Note that the high heat of some of these processes can cause dyes to run and fade. The braid I chose was one that I dyed several years ago. When I submerged my yarn in the very hot water called for in some of these processes, a lot of turquoise dye bled into the water. This may be because I didn’t set the color with enough citric acid, or because turquoise is a notably tricky dye, and the heat of the water loosened the chemical bonds between the wool and dye.

No matter what method you choose, remember that fulling is forever. While you might be able to pull apart strands of yarn that have started to full to each other, you won’t be able to reverse this process, so be sure to sample on a small test skein before you full a whole project!

Left, from above: yarn fulled in the washing machine, dryer, and with Kate Larson's method. Right, from above: yarn fulled with Judith MacKenzie's menacing method, Kim McKenna's hot/cold plunge, and Amelia Garripoli's rough-finishing method.

Kate Larson’s Gentle Fulling for Woolen-Spun

In “Fulling Woolen-Spun Yarn,” Kate writes:

After doing some small samples, I settled on a fulling procedure for this fiber and project. Always sample wet-finshes first—fulling is forever. First, I placed my skeins into hot tap water for about five minutes. I then pulled the skeins out, squeezed out excess water, and submerged in a second bath of cold water. Next, I took each skein out and squeezed to remove excess water. (The next step can be done in your bathtub or outside your home on clean pavement.) Throw the wet skeins against a hard surface several times. Lastly, give each skein several gentle snaps, reorganizing the yarn before hanging the skein to dry.

I followed Kate’s instructions, throwing the wet skein against the sidewalk five times. I suspect I could have thrown a larger skein against the sidewalk two or three times and gotten the same effect, but the small skein was very lightweight, even dripping wet, making the force less intense. After drying, my yarn that was wet-finished Kate’s way yielded a subtly fuzzy yarn that was nice and springy. Because the temperature changes weren’t as aggressive or prolonged as later methods, this skein retained most of its color, too. I would happily use this method on any woolen-spun yarn, but especially for stranded colorwork sweaters.

Above: unfinished yarn. Below: Yarn finished with Kate Larson's fulling method.

Kim McKenna’s Hot/Cold Plunge

In her Summer 2024 Spin Off article, “The Finish Line: Wool Wet-Finishing from Soaking to Thwacking,” Kim McKenna describes another way to use temperature to shock wool yarn into fulling:

This method relies on a temperature change to create a surface change in a handspun protein fiber. For easier transfer between the hot- and cold-water baths, I tie a thick, white shoelace through the center of the skeins to use as a handle. If you have heat-sensitive hands, you might also wish to wear rubber gloves.

I soak the skeins in a water/soap solution as hot as my hand can stand 50°–60°C (about 120°–140℉). After 40 minutes, I lift the skeins from the hot-water bath and give them a gentle squeeze to remove the excess liquid. I empty the basin, refill it with hot water (without soap), and prepare a second basin filled with cold water. Holding the skeins by the shoelace, I dunk the skeins up and down four to six times in the second basin. After their cold-water dunkings, I give the skeins a squeeze to remove the cold liquid before subjecting them to four to six dunks in the hot-water basin. I alternate between the hot- and cold-water dunks a total of six times. Any time the water in the hot-water basin drops below 43°C (110℉), I empty the basin and refill it with hot water. By the same token, if the cold-water basin starts to warm up, I empty and refill the basin with more cold water. The skeins rest for about 40 minutes in the final cold-water bath before they are removed and dried as described in the final steps above.

I followed Kim’s instructions, and the result was a subtly fuzzy yarn that was a little bit more springy than Kate’s fulling method. Even though this method used plenty of hot water, this skein retained its color well compared to some of the methods that follow. While it’s a little more labor-intensive than Kate's method, I love the springiness of the yarn, and think it would make a good all-purpose finish where you want a light amount of fulling.

Above: unfinished yarn. Below: Yarn finished with Kim McKenna's hot/cold method.

Amelia Garripoli’s Rough Finishing

In the upcoming Summer issue of Spin Off, Amelia Garripoli writes that she sometimes rough-finishes her yarns to strengthen them for hard-wearing garments like socks. She also finds that fulling is a great solution for the biasing often found in yarns with active twist. To use Amelia’s method, agitate your yarn for five minutes each in hot and cold water, then: