All Dyed Up!

Felted blouse in the dye pot.

I was really excited to dye my blouse, I was actually beginning not to like it much and was sceptical it was because it was lacking in color.  It just felt blah.  So into the dye pot it went and now I love it again:)  I really am a sucker for color.
I think it turned out magnificent!

Shoulder/Sleeve Detail, Love!

I was also really excited that I was able to mix a color and match it to the color palette I was looking at, recognize this beautiful periwinkle color from a certain photo below?

And since I can never just dye one thing, I did a little more mixing of colors and threw a few more things in dye pots:)
This first one is a piece of scrap cotton gauze with a few pieces of scrap silk felted into it.  That's one piece of fabric with 3 different fibers in it, which means when I throw it in the dye pot, you get 3 different colors, I love that!

felted cotton and silk yardage fabric

And this was the result.  The cotton stayed white since I was using acid dyes, so only the silk and wool reacted and took the dye, a very cool result.

full piece of fabric right out of the dye pot

the white sections are the cotton gauze, the maroon cranberry color is the wool, and the brown is the silk

Love the contrast in colors and textures!

If I had used natural dyes all of the fibers would have taken up the dye and the resulting colors would have all been different.  Amazing!


I also tried a little Shibori.  I did the Arashi pole wrapping method (which has become one of my favorite Shibori techniques) with a large piece of silk chiffon, ooooohhhh la la.

There is something so magical about using Shibori techniques with dyeing.  You have a general idea of what will come out, but you just never know till you unwrap it.  Needless to say it is always a beautiful result.

Here is the finished result draped on the dress form.  Looks like this piece will be turning into a lovely skirt.
Stay tuned to see how it turns out.