Author

Tilly Voss

Hi, I'm Tilly — I make small creatures with big opinions.

I'm Matilda Voss — Tilly to everyone except official documents — illustrator, needle felter, amigurumi designer, and the human behind Felt Fox.

I grew up in Duluth, Minnesota, the only child of two librarians, which meant long winters, tall book stacks, and a house where making things was simply what evenings were for. I drew constantly — almost always animals with jobs and strong personalities. If you dig through my childhood sketchbooks (I've kept every single one), you'll find a fox mail carrier who appears again and again, delivering letters through the snow. Longtime readers already know: that fox eventually got a website named after him.

The official route went like this: an illustration degree with a focus on character design, then five years as a freelance children's book and editorial illustrator. I loved inventing characters. But somewhere along the way, I got restless keeping them flat on paper.

Then came the winter of 2020. Snowed in and stir-crazy, I bought a needle felting kit on a whim and tried to felt a fox from one of my own illustrations. He came out lumpy. Slightly cross-eyed. Completely, undeniably alive. It was the first time one of my characters looked back at me, and honestly, that was that. I taught myself crochet and amigurumi the same winter — felting for sculptural, expressive pieces; crochet for the huggable, survives-being-loved ones — and my process has never changed since: sketch first, stitch second.

Felt Fox launched in 2021, and by 2023 it had become my full-time job, which still feels like a prank someone will eventually reveal.

Here's what I promise you around here:


Every pattern is a character. Not just a shape — a personality, engineered down to the millimeter. (Eye placement is everything. I will show you the 2mm difference between "sweet" and "haunted." It's alarming.)
Every pattern is tested. At least two wonderful humans from the Fox Den — my volunteer tester community — make each pattern before it publishes, and they're credited by name.
Hand-drawn diagrams. I illustrate every tricky step myself, because some moments (looking at you, invisible decrease) need a drawing, not a blurry photo.
The blooper reel stays. My failed prototypes get published on purpose. Lumpy is a personality trait, and my first attempts were deeply characterful.
Safety, always. Embroidered eyes for the under-3 crowd, no loose felted bits for babies or pets, and needle safety in every felting tutorial. The whimsy pauses for this part.


These days I work from a plant-crowded studio above a Minneapolis bakery — my wool permanently smells like sourdough, and I've accepted this as a feature. I share the place with about sixty houseplants and Clover, a grumpy toothless senior rabbit with full veto power over anything left within chewing range. When I'm not felting or hooking, I'm running kids' craft hour at the library (the librarian genes won), sketching strangers' dogs at the park with permission, or cross-country skiing with more enthusiasm than skill.

Whether you're here to make your very first wobbly creature or your fiftieth, welcome to the den. I'm so glad you found it.

Go make something with a face,
Tilly 🦊