White Gum Wool Tops

White Gum Wool Combed wool tops are the sliver taken from the step just before spinning at Design Spun, so it is gilled many times to give it the worsted fibre alignment, then combed.  It is a delight to work with either for hand-spinning or felting.

She-oak Heather is "dyed-in-the-wool", literally--the scoured fibre is dyed in several colours, then blended and "gilled" to mix the colours thoroughly and align them in the direction of spin.  I asked Design Spun, my mill, to keep aside a quantity of the sliver for hand-spinners and felters to play with.  Have fun!

Skylark heather is a pale lilac, reminiscent of the dawn light when the skylarks begin their liquid trilling song.

Gilled - The process of combing is accompanied by gilling, a process of evening out carded or combed top making it suitable for spinning. Combing separates out short fibers by means of a rotating ring or rectilinear row of steel pins. The fibers in the 'top' it produces have been straightened and lie parallel to each other.