Taking a break
02 Mar 2012 Leave a Comment
in dyeing
For once, I have a pretty good excuse why I haven’t been doing too much dye work… I’ve been taking some time off from it to work on other projects. For example, steampunk costuming for Teslacon. (If you’re unfamiliar with steampunk, you could look at some photos here - my costuming leans toward the Victorian reenactment side.
This year’s Teslacon involves a trip to the moon as part of the “story” of the convention. Since there’s always a fabulous formal ball, I really hope to dye up some silk that is reminiscent of outer space for my ball gown. Some of my earlier silk dye work looked more like the Milky Way and I’m trying to remember how I did some of it.
5 Things You Didn’t Think Of
25 Aug 2011 Comments Off
in dyeing
…before deciding to try tie-dyeing. You have your t-shirts, you have your dye, your soda ash solution, you’re all set, right? right? Not everything comes in a kit! Did you consider:
- Rags? You need some. Seriously. To set a drippy dye bottle on. To quickly wipe up a drip. To sop up a pool of messy soda ash solution before it dries. To dab your sweating brow (clean rag suggested). Paper towels are good, and they have their uses, but a bunch of old terrycloth towels ripped into rags are recyclable… and invaluable.
- A bucket of clean water? Because you accidentally got dye on your gloves and you don’t want to spread it around — so dunk your hand in the bucket. Because you want to dampen a rag to clean a drip — dunk the rag in the bucket. Because!
- A scissors? If you went old-school and tied your shirts with rubber bands, don’t expect to be able to neatly remove them when the shirts are done. Don’t drag your smeary rubber bands around your shirt, just cut them off. Carefully, of course.
- A spare pair of gloves? Nothing quite like doing your dye work outside or in the basement or on the patio or in the garage and having your glove rip. Now you have to trek back to the supply area for more, and you may be a smudgy mess. Just stick a spare pair in your pocket if your gloves are thin and rippable.
- A plan? There’s nothing quite like having six folded, tied, wet t-shirts facing you and suddenly not being able to remember which colors were going on which shirt. Make some notes before you start and mark each shirt when you fold it — for example, by putting a colored paper clip on one of its ties.
People who tie dye a lot barely remember to mention some of this stuff because it’s so second nature to them. Most of these I learned by that unyielding teacher named Bad Experience, so maybe this list will help somebody.
Verdigris II
22 Aug 2011 1 Comment
This is the result of the pole-wrapped veil with direct application of active Procion MX dyes. One problem I had with this veil was that I ran out of plastic wrap. Seriously. I wrap my pole projects in plastic wrap to keep them moist during batch, and I had that annoying experience of pulling on the roll.. and getting only the last 6 inches. I think that is part of why this did not end up a bit brighter.
Southwest
06 Aug 2011 Comments Off
Here is an uncorrected brown with turquoise accents. The “dark brown” became very coppery and pretty, so I’m glad I didn’t fool with it too much. My dance teacher snapped this one up.
Verdigris II in process
06 Aug 2011 Comments Off
Yes, it’s very messy!
This is 3 yards of silk wound on a PVC pole. No external resists. I apply the dye directly and wrap it up in plastic. And yes… cleanup is the worst part!
hot day
03 Jul 2011 Comments Off
A hot day outside means an unbearable day in our garage. An unbearable day in our garage means… time to dye with soda ash and Procion MX. I find that batching for four hours on silk in warm enough conditions provides some nice deep colors.
I thought I’d try dyeing some “edged” veils with direct application of activated dye. People like veils with contrast edges; normally I have to make them with two different tubs of dye and careful masking with plastic bags… it’s a pain in the neck. It would be nice if I could just squirt the dye on and have done with it. (What can I say? There are really only so many hours per veil I feel I want to spend.)
I folded one veil lengthwise and dyed the center brown and the edges a turquoise/green color. I didn’t correct the brown for silk hoping that the soda ash process would make it come out brown and not orange… it did get to be brown, but I hoped for a darker brown. I’ll go back to correcting I guess. The teal edges are very lovely but are (predictably) quite uneven. I knew it would not be a ruled line but hoped for a little better result than I got! Well. It still looks pretty cool.
I did one pole-wrapped veil in gold and green and turquoise. It is just yummy — makes me think of September when the leaves have just started to turn. Pictures soon.
Citric acid solution storage
12 Jun 2011 Comments Off
in dyeing
So I haven’t been able to do much dye work for a few months. Between crises at work and at home, I’ve just been busy. Then the moment I wasn’t busy… I picked up a nasty cold virus. So today I’m madly trying to catch up.
The first thing I needed to check was whether I had enough citric acid solution. I opened the jug to check, and… ewwww! Citric acid is apparently the perfect environment for mold. Can’t recall the last time I saw such a layer of fuzz on top of a liquid… well, okay, I think it was my work coffee much after I forgot to rinse it before a vacation. Bleah! I believe I’ll be making a note to only make small amounts of citric acid solution in future unless I have room to store it in the fridge!
and for my next trick
04 Apr 2011 Comments Off
I need to dye someone a pale pink and gray scarf.
Let me just say, “eek.”
I could try this in a low water immersion setup with gray and pale pink dyes, but I doubt this will work very well. The gray Procion MX dyes I have used lean towards blue on silk. So putting in a baby pink color will give me gray, pink… and purple areas. And the purple will probably be the darkest.
I could also dye part of the scarf in Jacquard’s acid dye for silver gray. it makes a beautiful, beautiful shimmery color. Then I’d have to dye a previously protected part of the scarf with pink dye… but I don’t have a good pink acid dye, so I’d probably have to do that part with soda ash and Procion MX.
OR, I could do the whole thing with soda ash and Procion MX. And… how about an arashi shibori pole wrap? Woo hoo! Now we’re cooking!
snow dye trial 1: not proven
04 Feb 2011 Comments Off
Well, I scrunched my fabric, put three inches of snow over it, poured on a cup of dye in “scribbles”, and went away for 24 hours.
Result?
Something that looks like a botched even-dye attempt. No fun breaking of colors. No speckles or geometric blotches. Why?
I suspect it’s because the snow we got is dry and fluffy and let the liquid dye run through very quickly and easily. It didn’t resist very well.
I think I’ll try again… this time with dry powdered dye. I hesitate to work with powdered dye; I don’t like it floating around in the air. But I’ll give it a shot.
The reject blue fabric will just have to be overdyed, I guess.
A foot of snow = time to try snow dyeing
01 Feb 2011 Comments Off
Snow dyeing is immensely popular and people have posted many photos of the cool effects of this technique all over the web. I found some pretty good instructions at Prochem and intend to try them out this week. Wish me luck!
