Below: These photos don't have anything to do with dye-
My husband's Mozza -worthy pizza:
Prickly pear blossom in the setting sun:
Update on yesterday's post:
The process of dyeing fabric, like painting, -all art making really, relies on a combination of skill and random occurrence.
I love all of the unexpected results that occur with hand dyeing. I had a really hard time waiting until the morning to wash the garments to see what would happen.
The whole tie dye revival is a bit funny. I grew up tie-dyeing stuff with my mom in the 70's! We used Rit brand dye we would buy from the grocery or drug store.
For my garments I used fiber-reactive Jacquard brand Procion dye fixed with soda ash.
Like Martha suggested in the comments, it does seem a bit difficult to get saturated colors with the hand-painting technique. The dark blue that I used faded - especially on the ivory double gauze shirt- but overall I am happy with the results.
The rundown: The cotton muslin took the dye the best, and seemed to fade the least- I did however, tie-dye this, and hand painted the others. Of course this one worked the best- this piece was just for fun, and not intended for sale.
Cotton double-gauze (ivory shirt and purple-grey dress) is in 2nd place- took the dye well, but did fade somewhat unpredictably in areas.
Linen (turquoise) blouse, faded the most. Least predictable of the fabrics to work with. I suspect this has something to do with the nature of the fibers, and the size of the molecules of the pigment used in the dye. Maybe linen needs to sit a bit more time in a dye bath to take color? Cotton seems readily absorbent. I'd be interested to hear about others experiences working with this type of dye & different fabrics.
Oh, and my sunburn I received whilst dyeing is very evident, by the way. Embarrassingly so. Very red against my ghost-pale skin. I was making myself a red & white striped blouse with Nani Iro Saaaa Saaa '10 fabric (visible in the first two photos) that I was planning on wearing on the 4th...I may have to rethink that now!
The process of dyeing fabric, like painting, -all art making really, relies on a combination of skill and random occurrence.
I love all of the unexpected results that occur with hand dyeing. I had a really hard time waiting until the morning to wash the garments to see what would happen.
The whole tie dye revival is a bit funny. I grew up tie-dyeing stuff with my mom in the 70's! We used Rit brand dye we would buy from the grocery or drug store.
For my garments I used fiber-reactive Jacquard brand Procion dye fixed with soda ash.
Like Martha suggested in the comments, it does seem a bit difficult to get saturated colors with the hand-painting technique. The dark blue that I used faded - especially on the ivory double gauze shirt- but overall I am happy with the results.
The rundown: The cotton muslin took the dye the best, and seemed to fade the least- I did however, tie-dye this, and hand painted the others. Of course this one worked the best- this piece was just for fun, and not intended for sale.
Cotton double-gauze (ivory shirt and purple-grey dress) is in 2nd place- took the dye well, but did fade somewhat unpredictably in areas.
Linen (turquoise) blouse, faded the most. Least predictable of the fabrics to work with. I suspect this has something to do with the nature of the fibers, and the size of the molecules of the pigment used in the dye. Maybe linen needs to sit a bit more time in a dye bath to take color? Cotton seems readily absorbent. I'd be interested to hear about others experiences working with this type of dye & different fabrics.
Oh, and my sunburn I received whilst dyeing is very evident, by the way. Embarrassingly so. Very red against my ghost-pale skin. I was making myself a red & white striped blouse with Nani Iro Saaaa Saaa '10 fabric (visible in the first two photos) that I was planning on wearing on the 4th...I may have to rethink that now!
My comment was erased! I'll try again...
ReplyDeleteJust wanted to say that I LOVE what you're doing and the line is looking GREAT!!! How fun...
All this talk of using dyes has me itchy to do it again (I am packing all that stuff up today and it won't be for a while) Can't wait to hang and dry my cloth in the breeze... I think that's my favorite part :^)
Have fun!
Oh this pizza looks delicious!
ReplyDeleteAnd I'm so impatient to see all of this in the shop!...
The de Young Museum in SF is going to open a fantastic Tie dye exhibition at the end of July. I have a link on my blog.
ReplyDeleteFabulous! It's sometimes painful, the learning curve, but now you know more for your next dyeing projects.
ReplyDeleteI am SO JEALOUS of your home-growing pomegranates! Here in NY I can only rely on the markets to have them for a brief period, some from CA, most from abroad.
As for your July 4th outfit, how about some blue and white to go with your own red? ;) Have a great holiday!
Jennifer, the collection looks great — I can't wait to see everything once you have it finished!
ReplyDeleteJulie and I just experimented with dying bandanas for The Slow Season. We used Jacquard's iDye (jumping on Apple's naming system?) and Dy-Na-Flo and I have to say, it was unpredictable (but exciting). We screenprinted one bandana and handpainted another.... And now we're trying to figure out how to beat them up a bit for softness.
Lovely.
ReplyDeleteAnd those pizzas ... yum. I wish I had an oven here.