ENTWINEMENTS

I think people enjoyed painting their skeins last Sunday afternoon.  A little color here, a little more there and soon everyone is into fun colors.

 

 

 

 

Now on to indigo, the oldest and yet the hardest dye to use.  There is already a lot on this blog about indigo since the Japanese love indigo so and it is the most forgiving dye to use for shibori, so it is great for shibori novices.  Let's just look at some pics of indigo dyed cloth:

 

 

 

 This is a T-shirt with a few lines of stitched shibori

 

 

 

I hope you can see how many colors of indigo there are.

 

I will be preparing the vat, all you have to do is bring your yarn or cloth ready to dye. The fiber should be cotton or other vegtable fiber to take the high pH of this vat. For those who want to know about making the indigo vat you can read instructions here.

 

Posted by Karren at 07:40 PM | Permalink

IMMERSION DYEING is the most common form of dyeing.  You make a bath in a pot or vat with lots of water and the dissolved dye, then add the prepared fiber.  Heat and stir until the dye is fixed to the fiber.  Then the fiber is removed from the bath, rinsed and dried.  In this process the dyeing and fixing are all one process.

It is possible to spread the dissolved dye on the surface of the fiber, then go though a process to fix it to the fiber.  This is called DIRECT APPLICATION and the dye can be applied to the prepared fiber by painting, silk screening, stamping, etc.  Dyes are usually fixed by steaming  but some can be fixed at a lower temperature for a longer time. After fixing the fibers are rinsed and dried.

The Dip Dye a Skein workshop (7 June) will do immersion dyeing and the Paint a Skein workshop (14 June) will be direct application.

Posted by Karren at 08:16 PM | Permalink

Every one has a different term for this kind of dyeing.  Each term describes a different aspect of the process or results, so they all are correct in their own way.  I call it dip dyeing which describes the process, others call it ombre (French for shaded), gradation dyeing  which is how it looks..  It can be monochromatic or not.

I am a visual person so here are some pics of one skein I dip dyed then wove.

I started with a about 8oz. skein of Henry’s Attic PFD coconut silk.  This yarn, 60%silk, 40% wool is fine and light weight yet the texture allows an open sett and the cloth to still be stable.  Unfortunately this yarn has been discontinued and replaced with a smooth yarn.  Anyhow here is the skein.

 

I must apologized for the shadows in the photo, I took the pics outdoors to get true colors and it was overcast.  Just as I took the first picture we had what the English call a sunny interval.
I dyed the whole skein a sand color then I dipped a small part of the skein in a black dye pot.  I did not get black, it is difficult to get a true black, but I got shades of grey from charcoal to light.  On important point here is that I layer the black on top of the beige color, dyes are transparent and you can see both the sand and the black colors.  Here is what is left of the skein after I dyed it and used it for a weaving project. 



 Note that there are no sharp lines where a color change occurs, rather the grey starts pale and then becomes more intense the fades back to sand color gradually.  No abrupt color changes but gentle shading from one color to the next.
I wove this on a rigid heddle loom, sett 10 epi, plain weave, and used just this yarn for the warp and weft.





I love this cloth!  Random streaks of grey that cross each other. The hand of the cloth is nice too (you’ll have to take my word until you can touch it your self), stable but not too dense or heavy. The cloth looks handwoven because it is hand-dyed. It has the look of khadi ( the cloth that played a part in Gandhi’s rebellion, handspun, handwoven and hand-dyed) even if the scale is different.
The special yarn could be used in just the warp in which case the grey streaks would just be length- or warp-wise.  Or just used in the weft and the streaks would be cross- or weft-wise.

When you see a larger expanse of cloth you can see that the rhythm of the streaks of the grey is different in the warp and the weft. 


This is because they are taken from the same skein and each warp is much longer than the length of each weft shot or pick.
Then I finished the edges, hemmed with an embroidery floss to make a tiny towel.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 What is a tiny towel? It is an answer to the question, “what are you making?”  In my mind I’m just trying to make beautiful, sensuous cloth.  Of course the edges have to be finished too. 

Now about the possibilities of this technique and your skein: 

 •    You can bring a skein of 8 oz. or less.  Must be an animal fiber to dye with the acid dyes we will use.   This will allow everyone a chance to dye their skein during the workshop.  Half a pound of yarn is enough for a small project.

•    The yarn can be white, natural or a pale color.  It is hard to over-dye black and see the results.  Remember that dyes are transparent and you will see the first color through the second.  If you start with yellow or a pale neutral color you can get just about any color except white by overdyeing.  If you start with an bright purple  the colors you can achieve by overdyeing are limited.
•    Your yarn should be in a loose skein with many figure eight ties to keep it from tangling during dyeing. It should be scoured and ready to dye.  If you can bring it damp, from scouring or just soaking overnight, it will be ready for the dye pot.  If it is dry it can take ½-1 hr. to soak in water to get ready to dye.
•    I will have the resources to dye your  yarn  one color and then over-dye a part of it.  In the example above the whole skein was dyed sand then dip dyed  in black.  Or you can just dip dye the skein to get white and one color (example in white and red) or just one color on top of your pale colored yarn. 

 

There are many possibilities with this dyeing.  You could have the dip-dyed yarn in only bands or stripes.  If the yarn was divided into two skeins both could be dyed the base color and only one skein dip dyed and you would have coordinating skeins.  I’ve made a short warp with a well secured cross and many figure eight ties that I will dye.  The result will be less random and lead to a graduated color in the whole piece.  We’ll see.  What fun possibilities!

TO CLASS PARTICIPANTS:Before you come I ask you to email me  your ideas on what color scheme you would like to dye.  Something like shades of blue, white with sunflower yellow or wheat with moss green.  This will give me time to mix the colors and have some color you might like when you arrive.  I expect you will want to try some thing different as you see others results.  It is just nice to have a starting point that reflects more than my taste.

 

 

Posted by Karren at 05:05 PM | Permalink

Our 7 June Sundye will use acid dyes.  Acid dyes will only color animal fibers and nylon because of their similar chemistries.  Wool is an animal fiber but what else is?  Here are some description from the Year of the Natural Fiber and links for those who like to know more:

 

 Alpaca wool - Alpaca is used to make high-end luxury fabrics, with world production estimated at around 5 000 tonnes a year

 

 

 

 

 

Angora wool - The silky white wool of the Angora rabbit is very fine and soft, and used in high quality knitwear

 

 

 

Camel hair - The best fibre is found on the Bactrian camels of Mongolia and Inner Mongolia, and baby camel hair is the finest and softest 

 

 

Cashmere - Cashmere is exceptionally soft to the touch owing tothe structure of its fibres and has great insulation properties without being bulky

 

Mohair - White, very fine and silky, mohair is noted for its softness, brightness and receptiveness to rich dyes

 

 

 

Silk - Developed in ancient China, where its use was reserved for royalty, silk remains the "queen of fabrics"

 

Wool - Limited supply and exceptional characteristics have made wool the world's premier textile fibre

 

 

 You can bring any of these fibers to dye with acid dyes or nylon.  Other fibers will not dye with these dyes.

 

The following week in Paint a Skein will will work with different dyes that color cotton and other cellulose fibers.  

Posted by Karren at 10:18 PM | Permalink

Scouring fibers is the process of removing waxes, oils, dirt, finishes and anything else that can interfere with dye uptake.  Scouring is the most important step to good dyeing.  If there are blotches of oils or perspiration in the fibers the dye will be a different color in those areas.  At the end of the scouring process the fiber should be free of interfering chemicals and nearly white.  Fibers in this condition are called Prepared For Dyeing or PFD.

Think of scouring as a vigorous washing that removes all contaminates and leaves behind no residue.  You can do it yourself or you can have some one else do it.

I could write a lot about scouring and still not cover your situation, so I’m going to try to keep it simple for beginning dyers.

1.    You can just wash your yarn and hope it works.  This works 80%  of the time with purchased white or natural yarn.
2.    You can buy yarn that is PFD.
3.    You can do a true scour, this is best when you know or suspect the yarn is dirty.

1.JUST WASH YOUR YARN
After you have made your yarn into a skein and secured it with many loose figure eight ties you can wash it.  The choice of detergent is important here; home laundry detergents can have bluing, optical whiteners and  perfume that they leave behind to interfere with the dyeing. We have specialized detergents for this: Synthrapol and Orvus Paste (you can get a small amount of these from me). Otherwise choose the simplest detergent you can get your hands on; no perfumes, should be colorless to pale yellow- baby shampoo for example.  Wash in hot water with a bit of detergent.  If you see dirt come out into the wash water, wash again.  Rinse 3-5 times to make sure all the detergent is gone. Wring.  No need to dry before dyeing, this first step of dyeing is to wet out the fiber.


2. BUY PFD YARN.
You can buy fibers that are commercially scoured or scoured and bleached that are labeled PFD.  These should be fine if they have not been soiled waiting for dyeing. Buying PFD is a time and hassle saver.

You can buy yarn that is ready to dye from your local hand-spinner.  She usually has cleaned the wool before spinning and she can tell you exactly what she did and how much lanolin is left in the wool.  Tell her you want to dye it  and does she think it needs to be washed again?

I know of two manufactures that make a wide range of PFD yarns that are available in many retail stores: Henry’s Attic ( most of their yarns are PFD) and Brown Sheep Company (avoid the Superwash wool and colored yarns). Visit their websites to find a retailer near you.  There are other sources too, but maybe have a more limited range.  White spun silk yarns are usually PFD as are white or natural perle cottons. The rayons and other regenerated cellulose fibers such as Tencel, bamboo, soy silk etc. are pretty clean  because of the manufacturing process.  I also have some extra PDF yarns I know dye well that you can buy, including Henry’s Attic Coconut Silk (a textured silk/wool yarn), call if you want to see what I have.


3.  A TRUE SCOUR
The scouring process differs by what you are trying to remove.  Cotton comes with naturally occurring waxes and pectins that are difficult to remove. Wool comes with vegetable matter, burrs and such that get caught in the fleece, and lanolin produced by the animal. Reeled silk has both the silk fiber, fibroin, and the gum, sericin.  The sericin has been removed in spun yarn and all supple silk yarns. Tussah silk and linen are challenging to prepare for dyeing.

Commercial yarns may be bleached, or have bluing or optical whiteners added, all  to make them appear whiter.  Any chemicals or residue left in the yarn can interfere with dyeing. Finishes, wash-and-wear, wrinkle resistant, mercerized, singed, flame retardant, water repellent, water proof, antistatic finish, peach finish and stain resistant, can be a problem. Some  of these, the wash-n-wear, wrinkle and stain resistant ones,  are a plastic or resin type coating on the fibers and are quite effective at blocking the dye from penetrating the fibers.  I find it best to avoid  these finishes.  Other process, mercerizing, singeing, degumming, pre-shrinking , do not leave chemicals behind to block the dye penetration but they do effect the color.  Mercerized cotton  will dye a much more brilliant, lustrous color than the same cotton unmercerized.  Degummed silk will dye lighter than the same silk with the gum; the gum is a protein too and also dyes with the protein silk fiber.


Hand-spinners deal with cleaning fibers and getting it ready for spinning and are a great source of information. The more you know about what you are trying to remove the easier it will be.  

Here is a general scour process:
•    Soak the yarn in water to cover for 30 min. or more.
•    Use a dyepot for the actual scour.
•    Add 1 or 2 gallons of water, enough to cover the yarn and allow it to move freely in the bath.
•    Add 1 Tbsp. soda ash and ½ tsp. Synthrapol for each gallon of water.
•    Add yarn and heat to boiling. Move the yarn gently in the bath so that all parts of the yarn are exposed to the hot bath.
•    Simmer 10 min. for wool and 30 min. for cotton.
•    Remove cotton from the hot bath. To avoid felting wool, allow it to cool to warm and remove to a rinse that is the same warm temperature.
•    Rinse the yarn 3-5 times.  Cotton can be wrung and is ready for use.  Wool needs a 20 min. soak in a vinegar bath (1Tbsp. white vinegar per gallon) then wrung.

No need to dry before dyeing, this first step of dyeing is to wet out the fiber.
If you have questions feel free to contact me directly.

Posted by Karren at 11:44 PM | Permalink

 What concentration to make your stock soultions?

Again to follow up on what Peg said  that I used 0.01% stocks.  Well sometimes I do and sometimes I don't.  When I worked with stock solutions all the time , I usually made Lanaset Stocks at 1%.  The Lanaset, and most acid dyes, have limited solubility and 1% is achievable with most of the dyes without additives. Fiber reactive I usually make 2%, they are more soluble and require higher DOS.

When I started dyeing batches of 2500-3000g of silk the volume of stock was too large.
For example dyeing 3000g of silk, a medium DOS of 3% with stocks that are 1% requires

3000g x DOS of 3%/1% stock =9000g or mL of stock

9000mL= 9L 

That is a lot of stock!  Now I used to make the stock in 1/2 gallon canning jars, that would only hold 1800ml so this would be a big, big chore to make 9000ml of stock. It is easier just to weigh out the dyes  powders for each batch.  90g of dye, even if it is divided up into 5 colors is still doable  even with a balance that only weighs to 1g.

But dyeing 450g of silk to the same DOS would require 1350ml of 1% stock which is convenient.

But when I sample for new colors I dye 5g swatches of silk.  So the same formula

5g x DOS 3%/1% stock=15 g=15ml 

gives me 15ml of dye stock.  So what would the effect of a drop of dye stock solution falling off the out side of the pipet into the dye bath.  Now a drop of aqueous solution we can guess to be about 0.2 ml, and

Posted by Karren at 05:16 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Peg is  continuing her samples, now she mixed orange and blue. 

She talks about the using the Lanaset Mustard yellow, which I call Gold, instead of the Lemon Yellow.  Actually the gold is the work horse in any dye set.  In Lanaset dyes the 2 colors I buy the most are black (high DOS) and gold.  The Lemon Yellow is very weak tintorially and I only use use it when I must.

What does weak tintorially mean?  It means that you can't get a very high DOS with the color.  It means that if you add one drop of Royal Blue you will have green and even adding lots more yellow it is hard to get yellow green.  It means that when dyeing neutrals, a mix of red, blue and yellow, you will be in the pale range and it will be difficult to get the yellow based browns and golds.  In Lanaset I usually use the Gold to mix neutrals.  It is gives greater DOS and closer in tintorial strength to the reds and blues making a larger ranger of colors possible.

 

So when would I use the Lemon Yellow? (Warning:I am now going to use terms to describe the color from the Munsell Color Theory.) Lemon Yellow is a dye with high chroma, that is it is a clear, bright color.  Gold is a dye of much lower chroma, it is a dull color.  There is no way to brighten a color, that is increase its chroma.  So if I want a final color that has high chroma, that is bright, I must start with high chroma dyes.  So If I want to mix a bright Spring Green I would need to start with the Lemon Yellow but the Gold would be fine for olive.  Mixing colors always decreases the chroma, I don't know anyway, just mixing dyes, to increase the chroma.  Thus the chroma of the pure dyes of a set limit the brightness achievable with those dyes.  Thus one can not use Lanaset to mix neon colors.

So using Lanaset dyes,  I might use Lemon Yellow with a tad of Turquoise (both high chroma) to achieve a bright Spring Green. 

I might use Gold, Navy and Magenta (a red with black in it) to mix a dark Olive-- a deep, dull color. 

Sage Green might be Gold and Royal Blue.

 The terms hue, value and chroma are used to describe colors.  I learned this from Munsell Color Theory.  I had to work hard to understand color and the most critical step was the The New Munsell Student Color Set.

This set has a a booklet with the Theory and exercises, notebook,  and color  chips.  You have to glue the color chips in the right places.  In this glueing you will learn more about color that you thought there was to know.  You will see browns are oranges and how many browns there are. You will see that black and yellow give a green.  Your eye will be trained to to see more colors.

Posted by Karren at 03:38 PM | Permalink

Getting the color you want is an essential skill in dyeing, this is usually why you are dyeing. There are several components to this skill, at least in the way I think about it.  I could write an entry on each part but today I'll just mention them.

1. Knowing color.  This is more than red+yellow make orange.  It is the difference between mixing a bright tangerine orange and a dull terracotta, both oranges.  Some people know how to do this because they have spent a lifetime mixing paints; watercolors, acrylics or oils.  The one big difference between dyes and paints is that there is no white dye.  Your undyed cloth is your white.  I did not have a lifetime of painting so I had to go with a more formal study of color. 
   
2. Knowing your dyes.  This involves dyeing up each dye color that you will be using to mix your colors at two different DOS.  Few dye colors are the true colors were would like for mixing so you have to learn ift the red is bright or dull, the yellow is a tad red or green...  This is a time consuming step for some people but it is essential when you start with a new dye set.  Ideally should be done on your fabric; each fabric is a different white and the colors are slightly different as a result.
3. Testing.  Dyeing is in no way, a "what you see is what you" get endeavor. Some dye goes on the fabric some goes down the drain.  Wet and dry fabric look different.  Making samples is the sign of a good dyer.  To make samples work you need to kept accurate records so that you can later dye the project.

Peg in South Carolina at TALKING ABOUT WEAVING, is currently doing dye samples for her next project.

Here she has 7 hues at 2 different DOS.  You can see larger picture on her blog.  Now she is tackling chromatic neutrals, you know those wonderful neutrals that still have a tinge of  a color like blue grey or pinkish beige.

This series she got by combining yellow-green with red-violet.

Neutrals are always a challange when dyeing.  They are basically a very controlled mix of all 3 primaries--yellow, red and blue-- here the blue is combined with the other primaries (yellow+blue=yellow-green, red+blue= red-violet).  These colors can change a lot with one drop of dye; a drop of blue can change a color from brown to olive. 

I love these colors, the chromatic neutrals.  They are chamaeleon colors,one color  beside blue can look like goldish, then beside yellow  look mauve.  Joseph Albers  illustrated this effect in his studies. They are marvelous in multi-colored shibori dyeing since they increase the complexity of the color.

 

 

Posted by Karren at 12:23 PM | Permalink | Comments (3)

Folding origami is the easy part. Dyeing it is the hard part. Getting dye thru all those layers is the challenge.
Dyes have different ease of penetration. I percieve the penetration to be the highest with fiber reactive dyes , so in orger of decreasing penetration

discharge (sulfur dioxide, a gas)
fiber reactives
acid dyes
indigo

My theory assumes that larger molecules penetrate less. Even so the book shows that good penetration can be achieved with even indigo. How do they do it?

First they buy ready-to-use indigo in a bottle:

Aren't you a wee bit jealous? I'd love to buy ready-to-use indigo.

Then they place the tied cloth in an appropriately sized plastic bag:

Then some ready-to-use indigo is added to the bag:

The air and blue indigo are removed from the bag and then the bag is clamped shut. This is the critical step-- having the bag totally filled with the indigo bath and no air. Here is another picture of a larger piece: left: expelling the air, right: then clamped.

Once you have the bag sealed, you can then massage the wad of cloth inside to increase the penetration.

This way they have achieved good penetration on dense cotton with even indigo.

Posted by Karren at 08:53 AM | Permalink | Comments (6)

In our push to get jackets ready for the last show I did 6 jackets in one batch, with more agitation than in the previous dye baths. The black came out great but the resists were not tight enough for the level of agitation. So when the threads were removed they looked like this:

Needless to say we did not take these to the show. We dyed some in a denim color afterwards and they came out nicely. But the lesson is that just changing one thing can change the result.

Another jacket that did not travel to the tropics, is one that had the hydrangea design:

One tiny hole and the whole jacket is ruined! This usually happens when the stitches are removed.

There was an African woman who attend the International Shibori Symposium in Santiago, Chile who was the best at a technique the involved embroidery stitches on a glazed cotton. The white cloth is embroidered with raffia then dyed, then the embridery stitches are remove. She was the best because she never cut the cloth. Quite a feat!

Here is one piece that has been done with raffia embroidery.

Posted by Karren at 12:14 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

More sample, try 2. Revised formulas ( formulas are under the sample on the paper)-- more DOS for black but since there are no hue issues I went ahead and stitched a resist. I want the design to appear black and white and the cloth is very creamy, I think that it will read B&W but needed to test. Reformulated the blue and tried a kumquat color on this new fabric.

B&W looks good. Blue is closer but not there yet. Kumquat is too light and too yellow.

Reformulated the blue and kumquat and added fig, a lavender gray. Made some simple bindings on the blue sample. The binding worked well. I like all of the these colors. And I know that both stitching and binding work well with this fabric.

Did you notice the little yellow numbers on the samples. This is a neat pen; you write on the cloth before it goes into the dye bath and you can still read it after the cloth is dyed. Sure makes it easier to keep track of all my experiments in one dyebath.

Posted by Karren at 05:13 PM | Permalink

I am working on some colors on a new silk fabric; this requires that I adjust even old formulas. The new fabric is a silk noil; duller, matte and cream colored instead of true white like the china silk I usually use. I am working with Lanaset dyes.

To make the whole process so as painless as possible I mix up a large bucket of dye bath. This is easy for me since I add my additives based on the volume of the bath not on WOF. So 1g/L works for the samples and in the batch bath. I adjust the pH then just keep the bucket handy. When I want to dye a small sample I just dip out of the bucket and I’m ready to go.

Similarly I make up 0.1% Stock solutions to use (actually they were made the last time I was doing samples and since they keep well, so I just used them). I usually dye 5g swatches so the dilute stock helps with accuracy.

Then I use 3 flasks that I can put at the same time into a constant temperature bath. I have to stir by hand but a thermostat controls the temperature. So I set it at 40°C to start then to 60° and last to 85°C.

Here are 3 swatches I did in about 1 hour; black, purple passion and a new denim color. The black could be a little darker it has a bit of a charcoal effect. Swatch two looks good but the blue needs the hue blackened and value darkened.

Posted by Karren at 12:27 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

I promised you some pictures of finished things from our Dye Day. We did T's and cotton bandanas. In indigo we did fold & clamp (itajime), stitching (mokume) and binding.

Some pieces were more successful than others (per usual). We all seemed to forget that indigo does not penetrate very far -- the underside of a thick cotton jersey does not look nearly as blue as the exposed side does. Folding a T-shirt in half before making the resists protected the inside from the indigo. We did get some good areas (as hoped for). On our last Dye Day we used fiber reactive dyes that really penetrated.

Here are two shirts made with the same technique, but different styles.

I mixed up three fiber reactive colors and tried out the Dylon Black dye.

The Dylon black is really black but the lighter areas where the dye diffused in are definately blue. The tree is a stitched resist and the other is a combination of shibori -mountain path- with a tie-dye stained glass effect. Then there were some colors left over...

Used standard tie-dye techniques. Matching bandanas and T's.

And last was a request for a dragon.

And then the bag that wouldn't close got two drawstring put into it instead of one and it now closes tightly but in a line not a circle, and the bottom has a button.

I'm packing for my last show of the year, Crafts Park Avenue. Come and see some shibori.

Posted by Karren at 11:20 AM | Permalink | Comments (3)

Glennis responded to my entry in a comment

*What qualities do those made by master-craftsman have that differs from that made by a hobbists/novice? I think of master-craftsman as someone who has explored in depth the process, perhaps the history of a craft and has spent substantial time practicing, learning and exploring their art form (oops-said the "A" word). A hobbyist/novice is breaking the surface but not necessarily devoted to the craft/practice by choice. The difference in the end result of the object is probably most apparent to the maker them self. I have seen exquisite works created by master-craftsman and hobbyists/novices alike-this is a difficult question for me to answer. *Are these objects endowed with properties that are a reflection of their maker's culture and times? I believe this is true. I love to wander museums and look at crafts from other places and times. I always fantasize about who the maker was and the environment in which the object was made often comparing it to objects in my daily life. Could I make it? Would I? Why? *Thus would the object have the same properties if she designed it and had it made in China/Thailand (you fill a country with low labor costs)? NO! Don't get me started on this one......this is a completely different thing in my book. I have seen the results of this many, many, many times. And its effects on 1.) the original maker, 2.) the end product , 3.) the marketplace. Even if you take an object and have it made by hand here, under your own supervision there is a difference. As artists, craftsman, hobbyists, and novices we choose our result and our path.

I do make things by hand and have no other source of income, so needless to say I've spent a few hours driving thinking about this. It sound to me like you are saying that there is no place in our market place for hand-made (in this case made start to finish by one person) in the US. The women in Ms. Shroff project spent from 3 mo. to a year making their panels. Lets assume that they spent the majority of their time taking care of their families and I have no such responsibilities, so I can make panels faster say one a month. Lets also asume that I want to earn $30 000 in the year, this is a modest income to pay for health insurance, a home and it's utilites, a car and taxes. That means that I must sell 12 panels (without incurring any marketing costs or the price will go up) for $2500 each.

Do you truly think there is a market for dozen $2500 textiles this year?

If not then one needs to think of a way to make more- such as help- or faster made products. If I have some one else iron them are they still hand-made? How about having the hems hand -rolled in China? Does the cloth need to be hand-woven? I think we need a better defintion of hand-made.

Posted by Karren at 09:59 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

I attended a demonstration by a silk painter at a guild meeting the other day and was suprised to hear her talk about " water based silk dyes" which she steams but uses a "fixative" which simply needs to be ironed to fix. Apparently these are French "dyes".When someone tells me that something needs to be ironed to fix it, I usually interpret that as being a resinous substance similar to extender.

This has got me curious as I have used both acid dyes and reactive dyes on
silk but have always used the appropriate vinegar or soda ash. I must admit
I have never steamed anything.From what I could get out of her the dyes come
from France and are used by the fashion houses there to dye silk. I must
admit I was impressed with the strength of colour as well as the hand of the
fabric.

Does you have any idea what these "dyes" could be?

French silk paints or dyes (the terms paints and dyes are misused interchangeably) are usually acid dyes dissolved with the acid added. Others are pigments in a thin water suspension and are really paints; these are heat set with an iron.

The biggest problem with preparing acid dyes in this manner is that some colors won't dissolve enough to give a strong color so additives are used to increase the solubility of the dyes. Traditionally this has been alcohol, but breathing alcohol vapors all day can effect the human body so some companies now use other additives such as urea or glycols.

I think that ironing is a substitute for steaming or heat setting. Most times you get even more intense colors by steaming. Did you know that you can use a dryer to heat set dry textiles?

I don't know what the fixative is, could be something to change the pH to make it set faster or a very dilute binder like those found in textile paints. The ones I've seen are thin like water.

You can make your own from the acid dyes you already have.

For further reading steam vs. chemical fixative,

Posted by Karren at 12:07 PM | Permalink | Comments (3)

I had a question the other day about how to get a dark color with indigo. The answer is many dips, But words are not nearly as effective as a picture, sweetgeorgia posted a picture of 10 dips . Scroll down to the 2nd picture and you can see the progression from 1 dip (lt. blue) to 10. Looks to me like some are dry and some are wet and wet makes cloth look darker, even so you get the idea. Indigo is not for the one-shot-mamas.

Posted by Karren at 01:44 PM | Permalink | Comments (3)

I have made a few posts (i, ii, iii, iv) about using a black dye to get black and white shibori. You want a true, deep black and white (determined by the whitness of the cloth you are dyeing) and of course, shades of grey. What you don't want is shades of blue or pink or halos of purple--that is any color. There have been success and failure; not an easy task to get B&W.

Fiber influences your chance of success; both Neki and I have achieved it on silk. My failures have been on cotton.

The dye also effects the outcome; we had success with Lanaset Black and Dylon Ebony Black. Now Lanaset is an acid dye and acid dye families usually have a black manufactured color (not a mixture of other colored dyes) . The Lanaset one is a true black,some from other acid dye families have a cast, say purple for example. So the Lanaset one is special. There are probably other true black acid dyes that I don't know, there are a lot of acid dyes. Now fiber reactive dyes, commonly used for cotton, do not usually have a black manufactured color and the black is mixed from navy, gold and red. The mixed black then separates during shibori, rather like chomotography, leading to colored halos. The mixed fiber reactive black might be beautiful in an immersion dyebath, or in direct application but they give us trouble in shibori. But there tend to be several mixed blacks and each may be designed for a specfic application process; the pad-batch black might be different than a immersion bath black. Fiber reactive dyes also work on silk (standard processing) and so you might find a silk black and a cotton black (here there are 8 blacks/greys for the old fiber reactive dyes, Procion MX).

While I was out buying notions to finish up the outfits for Artwear in Motion I saw some Dylon dye, black that had worked so well for Neki. So I am now the proud owner of 1.75 oz. of #12 black. From the package I learned it contains trisodium phosphate and reactive black 5. I suspect that this means it contains one dye that is black, not a muixture of dyes. I can't wait to try it on cotton!

Posted by Karren at 07:22 PM | Permalink | Comments (3)

Neki over at A Movable Feast has been having trouble with black and shibori similar to the B&W on cotton here (part 1, part 2). She is working with silk;

Yesterday I took my "real black" dye and shiboried and dyed a piece of silk hoping to get super black on white.This will later become inserts for my red top which is in process right now.
To make a frustrating loong story short" real black" my eye. It dyed with a hideous reddish overcast. Will have to overdye with navy to try and kill the red..................Arashi means storm and we have had a lot of that recently.It was forseeable after such a hot summer......One thing I discovered was that a black MX dye that had been reported in various forums as being it didn't meet the grade, separating and haloing during immersion dyeing like crazy. Back to my trustworthy never failing Dylon black.

So now we know Lanaset black and Dylon will both work for silk shibori, giving a true black and white.

Posted by Karren at 11:19 AM | Permalink | Comments (4)

It's easy to get excited dyeing indigo shibori at the Textile museum in DC and the event 1 July.
Indigo is ideal for first shibori projects because it is so easy to resist. And the fuzzy edges have nice gradations. The hard part is the indigo vat---the second time you set up a vat it is straight forward. But now there is instant indigo, a freeze dried mixture that contains indigo, alkali and reducing agent and all you have to do is dissolve it. Here is an excellent description of its use. I bought my instant indigo from John Marshall, who was one of the first to sell it here in the US. Others sell it now in smaller quanities,Paraside Fibers. I would probably call Earthues and order indigo from Michele Wipplinger.

Once you feel comfortable with the indigo vat, it is cheaper just to buy regular indigo. Michele at Earthues has an indigo kit, her instructions are the best!

Posted by Karren at 08:53 AM | Permalink

We had a DYE DAY yesterday and I tried the new Procion MX dye from Pro-Chem , #609. I got cold feet about trying it on my carefully stitched T-shirt because of my previous experience.

Continue reading "More about black and white" »

Posted by Karren at 04:18 PM | Permalink

I wrote an article for SHOPTALK, a column in the Surface Design Association's newsletter called A Dye by Any Other Name... that is interesting to any one trying to dig out technical information on dyes.

Posted by Karren at 04:59 PM | Permalink

Tomorrow we will have a DYE DAY here at the studio. This is a day when we dye for ourselves. We also invite a few nearby friends and occasionally one shows up.

I hope to get some black and white T-shirts to expand my summer wardrobe. It needs to be black and white, with maybe shades of grey but black, white, grey and pink would not be acceptable.

Getting black with any dye can be a challenge. It is easy to get dark grey but getting dark enough to get a black, ahh--- that is a real achievement. Then there is the color of black--- some blacks have a blue cast, others a red cast. Getting a neutral black is another piece of the puzzle. For me, getting black on cotton is much more difficult than getting black on silk. This is because the acids dyes that I use have a manufactured color that is a neutral black. Fiber reactives dyes, that are commonly used on cottons, have no black dye.

So a black fiber reactive dye for cotton has to be a mixed color; typically navy, gold and some red. Getting the right mix for this substrate and for this dyeing process is tricky. It is not a simple as buying a mixed black, a small change in process, say letting the dye-bath cool during processing instead of holding the temperature constant, can change the relative fixing of each dye color and the black has a red cast. So there are many different black mixes available and I have at least 3 different formulas that I mix myself.

Getting black and white, on cotton, in shibori is even more complicated. Shibori depends on diffusion of the dye for its fuzzy edges and each dye has a rate of diffusion dependent on its molecular structure (this is the basis of chromotography). Since a black mix has 3 dyes with 3 different molecular structures, the dyes tend to separate when they diffuse creating halos of different colors.

Continue reading "Black and white on cotton" »

Posted by Karren at 08:57 AM | Permalink | Comments (3)

This is my shibori on cotton T-shirts. Indigo and shibori are natural partners. The Japanese shibori still being made in Arimatsu Shibori is mostly indigo on white cotton. I am including some simple instructions for making an indigo vat. This article was orginally written and published as a SHOPTALK article in the newsletter published 4 times a year by the Surface Design Association. Indigo is not a simple subject so I expect to revisit it.

Continue reading "Indigo and a Simple Vat" »

Posted by Karren at 08:57 PM | Permalink | Comments (4)