Dyeing...

Look - I've dyed a colour wheel and bits of yarn to match.

I had quite a lot of fun dyeing those bits of cloth.... no - I didn't dye those tiny little fabric segments, the actual fabric pieces are much bigger (fat quarters actually :)) I find it quite exciting waiting to see what comes out of the bag. (I dye in plastic bags.) Yet, even when you remove the dripping cloth from the bag it's never clear what beauty lies within, until you've washed out all the residual dye and the fabric is dried and ironed. It's like magic.

Dyeing yarn was interesting but I don't think I've the patience to dye yarn very often. It's fiddly and inclined to get tangled. Things did improve once I found that if I washed them in those little net bags you get with washing powder tablets they didn't get so tied up ... but nevertheless I need to find a good reason to dye yarn on a regular basis.

Feast your eyes on the beautiful colours in this. This is hand dyeing using two complementary colours; blue with orange

That piece of cloth almost looks marbled, there are so many colours running through it. All that colour mixing going on in the the tray with blue and orange produced deep rich greens, an amazing number of different blues, yellow, oranges, and bits of rich burnt brown . It's a riot of colour and there are so many organic patterns running through it, almost like pictures of crystals. It's really quite beautiful.

This is a piece of silk dyed using the same colours as the cotton fabric above but the colour is so much softer as is the patterning of the colour across the fabric.

It never cease to fascinate me. I suppose that's why they say it's addictive, the unprecidability of the whole process keeps you coming back and trying another mix.

I've some other complementary colour mixes to try today, just to see what alchemy occurs. Think I'll try red and green next... wonder what'll get?

Comments

[Topcat]

I love blue and orange together....I have a quilt on the go with just those colours. I'm trying to be on a fabric diet so I overdyed some print fabrics I had in my stash where the colours didn't suit my blue and orange aspirations. I love the unpredictability too, you do have to be prepared to go with the flow to make them work in a different way to how you'd planned sometimes, but there you go, some say you make your own serendipity! Thanks for the yarn dyeing tips by the way - not tried that yet although I think my OH will faint if I try any more crafts

I love both of the fabrics but something about the silk one makes me want to see how it looks quilted all over - what are you planning to make with them?

[Nadine]

I'm probably being a bit thick here but how do you dye in a bag? I have done tie-dying with my class before but always just used a bucket. A bag sound much less likely to end in disaster. Thanks

Nadine