When a friend moved out of the area back in March, she wanted to give me all her dyeing supplies, including almost a full bolt of PFD fabric. I wanted to pay her for at least some of it, particularly all that fabric, but she'd have none of it. Instead, she asked that I dye some of it up for her, as the reason she was giving all that away was because her new home had no place for dyeing. Well, YES, I can do that, gladly! However, it wasn't until last week that I suddenly felt energized enough physically and excited enough mentally to finally tackle this task. It's been quite a while since I've dyed up some fabric so I knew I'd need to review the whole process, my notebook of recipes, and check my setup out in the garage. I initially felt a bit overwhelmed as when I asked what colors she might want, it was pretty much everything but blues. I also found the dye run worksheet from the last time I dyed and where I'd left off, i.e. what colors I had meant to dye up to flesh out my stash all that time ago. I needed to come up with a plan.
I started by inventorying my friends' individual dyes which I added to the inventory I'd made of my own dyes. Mine are oh so old now - the legacy of my late friend's and my dyed fabric business and a more recent friend's clearing of her art studio of supplies related to textiles. Even some more recent purchases I've made are getting on in years - 2017 looks like when I got them and dyed them up. Scanning through old posts, it looks like 2017 was the last year I did any dyeing except for some snow dyeing early in 2018 & 2019. Hmmm. Not like I don't have a pretty big stash of hand-dyes while my actual making of quilts, etc. has slowed a great deal which might be part of the reason dyeing has waned. At any rate, newer fresher more reliable results-giving dye powders are a welcome addition. I noted there were some I had not tried before, and those became my starting point.
I worked with half-yard pieces, using my standard 4-step gradation recipe on some and choosing select 2 steps for others. My friend indicated she didn't need a lot of lights, just mostly medium and dark values, so the 2 steps eliminated those lightest steps. I checked my old freezer bags for leaks but not very well apparently. I did six bags at a time and every time I had leakage. Guess I should just get new bags.
I got a pretty good rotation going, getting 6 bags of fabric dyeing to sit overnight each day, and while they were steeping, starting the processing of the previous day's bags of fabric. And oh look - the gloves that were fine the last time I used them to dye also now leak. Boy, soaking and rinsing takes so much time. By the end of the week and 24 half-yards of fabric later, I was totally worn out!
Results were mixed. These two were new to me and I absolutely love how the Mixing Red came out. The Jade Green not so much. Does that look like Jade to you? No, it is more aqua marine or turquoise and my friend had asked for greens not blues.
I did 2 steps each of 3 different purple dyes: back to front they are Purple, Deep Purple and Grape. Ooo, I DO like how they came out. Hope this is not too much texturing for my friend but she did indicate she liked texture.
These yellows were the last one I did and I'm not all that happy with the results. I think I was getting tired, a little sloppy with my measurements and not doing enough massaging of the bags. The one on top is a four step gradation from Golden Yellow dye and doesn't look anything like the swatches on my recipe. It lost all its yellow and the lighter steps may be destined for an overdye. The next one down is a four step gradation of the Lemon Yellow dye - the lightest steps may need overdying - and the last are two steps of Sun Yellow dye - a little hard to see in this picture but it's a slightly warmer yellow than the lemon yellow.
So some successes and some disappointments - so goes hand-dyeing often. I still need to work out some greens for her - a teal green and a lime green from my recipes - and some orange and hope for the best. I've made quite the dent in her yard of fabric, will keep a fat quarter of some of these for myself and cut swatches of others for my records. But for now, I need to give my poor body a rest!
4 comments:
Wow! That was a huge amount of work! I have no idea how to dye fabric but admire the results! Would the yellow you're not crazy about become a lime green with some added 'help'? (Remember I know zero about this process!) I especially like the turquoise next to the red--great combination! Jan in WY
Yes, Jan you're thinking what I'm thinking. The "jade green" that looks so blue might help the yellow become the green I need. Will have to experiment with a little overdyeing. I agree that the turquoise next to the red looks really good, kind of a southwest look if put in a quilt.
you are very precise in your work--I was never so precise; I always told folks I was a sloppy dyer---not messy, but I was never looking for reproduciblity. I did ice dyeing--figuring out a way to use sand to distribute the dye particles as the ice melted. We don't get much snow in this part of Texas. Always fun to fold up freshly dyed fabric and see what you've got--even if just looking on a computer screen.
Well Sylvia, a think precision is in my DNA, even from childhood. I never enjoyed finger painting, never played in the mud, and always liked having directions to follow and answer my questions about a process. So no surprise that when I started playing with dyeing, I followed the directions carefully, at least until I had a full understanding of what was going on. Now my good friend who was learning dyeing right along with me was a totally different personality, didn't want to bother with exact measurements and didn't mind making a mess! And yet we went into business together for awhile selling our hand-dyes. And I had to present my case strongly that we had to be able to duplicate colors precisely for customers that might need more of something they'd bought from us. The compromise was we'd have a line of 4 step gradations from specific recipes and a separate line of "one of a kinds" that she would make with her preferred slap dash method that produced wild and interesting yardage, probably more like the way you dye. It just instilled in me a certain procedure that is second nature and hard to break out of. However, I do break out a bit now and then with experiments using up leftover dyes and have enjoyed snow dyeing sessions, the ultimate in randomness! You are so right about the pleasure at the end when you get to see how everything came out. I actually enjoy ironing and especially ironing freshly dyed fabric.
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