community of dyers

I love this project, sent in by its creator, Renee Carmel:

I live in a country that is going through a serious drought at the moment, unfortunately. Therefore, each person is given almost "water rations" and anything above that ration is a HUGE tax on your water bill.

so here's my question:

When I Tie-Dye, I use up a tremendous amount of water. I use a grate that I put each piece (or a number of pieces) onto, dye them, and then rinse the grate off for the next round (this is not to mention the water in the dye mixtures themselves or the soda ash solutions). After the dye reacts, I rinse everything off and THEN put it into the washing machine...

I started out with this dress I got at shopgoodwill.com. It's 100% silk (exclusive of lining/decoration), Mori Lee, no size marked but I'd guess about a 10, and in pretty good shape but not wedding-ready (loose sequins, etc.). I cut out the crinoline and it will need some repairs to make the lining not hang out the bottom now:

I twisted it up and stuffed it into a 12-qt pot:

Then poured yellow and red dye over it (Dharma Bright Yellow and Dharma Sunrise Red, Procion MX dyes), along with vinegar, and heated it to boiling:

A couple things I've had happen lately, all together within a few days, which makes me wonder if the moon affects tie-dye as much as it seems to affect my kids. LOL

An otherwise lovely maternity top, dyed in a nice blue with a strip across the middle, came out kinda cool, BUT I didn't see the splotch of WHITE PAINT smack in the middle of the belly before I dyed it a nice deep color with a non-random pattern. Can't get this one back - can you say homeless shelter donation? :-( Anyone know how to get latex paint off shirts for the future?

Did another maternity top in a fantastic yellow-to-orange color gradation, looking for nice strong color. Miked it up strong, applied liberally - REALLY liberally! Looked fantastic wrapped in plastic wrap batching, washed it out to find really REALLY pale spots here and there. This was a used shirt, used and laundered enough that the non-label label is barely readable enough to say Pea in the Pod (no idea what size top it is either!), so I think safe to say no more factory finishes on the shirt. I RE-dyed it yesterday, and after washout the paler spots are STILL THERE! :-( What the hey?

This is my latest project. Since I'm mostly a self-taught dyer, I have no idea how original this idea is; maybe it's common knowledge and I just reinvented the wheel. But anyway, I like it and I thought I'd share.

What I've been doing is filling my dye pot (an 8-qt stockpot) about 1/4 full, with 1/4 cup dye powder, about a cup of salt, and 1/2 cup soda ash. Then I carefully set a bunch of dry tied items into it so that it's packed pretty full and the clothing won't shift around too much. I try to get each garment partially in the dye - like dipping an Easter egg halfway.

Then I pour a complimentary (usually darker) color on top - mixed with water, but no soda ash; the ash in the first batch of dye is enough for the whole pot. Then another color, etc. I let it sit for a while without stirring at all, then dump out the dye and wash.

I just made about 30 adult tee-shirts - half in spirals and half smiley faces. when I untie them and rinse them out, they look amazing. when I wash them, most of the black from my spirals washes out and a lot of the navy blue that I used for the eyes and smiles of the smiley faces washed out completely OR partially giving my smiles a "teeth" look to it. I dont get it and its very frustrating because I they look so amazing when I untie them.

I am storing my mixed dyes in a room in my house that doesnt get hot, and is nice and cool and I always add more dye powder and water before making new things...whats going on here???

Paula, forgive me, I couldn't see an appropriate topic. It IS what I'm working on right now, tho...

I've got a bunch of stuff to dye. First off, I wanted to finally get to the shoes I'd bought a few years ago. (for some reason I just keep forgetting about them)

So I mix up my soda ash solution while pre-washing my blanks. I forgot to put the shoes in the wash, but figured no big deal.

When the wash was done, I put the shoes in the soda soak, with a couple larger items on top to weight them down.

After about 30 min or so I think the shoes should be nice and soaked, so I pull the dresses off... and my soda soak is now deep yellow. EEEK! Not only that, but the formerly white shoes are now more cream.

I would like to try peace signs (even though they are kind of a tie-dye cliche) and crescent moons (which I saw recently). I'm reading on Paula's site that there are a whole bunch of different ways to get a great peace sign. which way do you use? do any of you use those iron on transfers? I personally feel like thats really cheating and would rather actually tie it myself...

have you ever made a crescent moon before? I would really like to start branching out and trying new stuff...

thanks!

~Elisheva
www.groovesters.com

yes yes, it was a stupid joke - but it made you smile, right?

I have tried LWI in the past and I got HORRIBLE results. I'm thinking of trying it again. most stores here dont really like the bright and amazingly awesome colors that makes tie-dye what it is - so im thinking of trying to tone down some of my items so that these stores will make an order...

I have seen Dyers who will make a shirt that has a heart on it (or any design) and the surrounding color on the shirt will look like LWI or "crinkle" design. as I dont really know how to do either of them, how do you do it? and how do you do it without messing up the design in the center of the item?

I have been seeing and hearing from all different kinds of dyers who say that they will soak their items in soda ash and then let them dry and then some who dont let them dry. what is the difference and what are the benefits of both?

thanks!

~Elisheva
www.groovesters.com

hi I am new to this forum and excited about sharing information! I am a dance costume designer and I love to experiment with surface design!! Almost everything I dye stretches in one way or another. Here are some past costumes that I have dyed. The cream and purple dress is hand painted silk. The purple and pink costumes are a combination of low immersion and dip dying, cotton lycra, the blue jumpsuit is a discharge dye with bleach, cotton lycra, the multi colored unitards are painted, cotton lycra, the green are a combination of low immersion and directly sprinkling dye powder onto the fabric,nylon lycra.

Ive been noticing that sometimes when I tie-dye, things will come out very faded looking and not that bright, and sometimes its intense color. I dont get it. I just dyed a whole ton of things including onesies, bibs and hats. the hats came out kind of blah in terms of color brightness (and yet still very cute) but the bibs were crazy intense color. not only that, the onesies were also intense in color. I dont get it. I'm looking at a shirt that I made for my son a couple of months ago and it is no where near as bright as the onesies I made today. I thought that the procion dye will not fade...?

I have a customer who wanted me to dye a dress for her 3 year old daughter and actually went out and bought the dress for me to dye (I dont dye dresses - too expensive)

anyways, she bought this dress that has a lining in it - not only that, but the the top part of the dress is double sided and thick - which scares me. oh - not to mention it has sequins and lace on it as well.

I basically told her that I cant dye it because I dont think it will come out even with the lining. ESPECIALLY since there is this cotton see-through material with designs on it in the skirt part(I have dyed material like this in the past- it may be 100% cotton, but in actuality the see through part is not cotton and will not take the dye. its a very cool effect for bandanas but not for a dress).

I attempted to immersion dye two 100% rayon dresses. I bought them from the store a mustard yellow and want them to both be Black. I use pro chemicals' Deep Black. They rayon did not pick up the color. I tripled the amount of dye that I normally use for Black which is a higher dose than recommended by the company because I found that it needs more to get a deeper hue. Anyways I also dropped some cotton fabric and it colored beautifully Dark.

I don't know if I need to treat the rayon fabric differently before the immersion process.

Please help!! NOw I have two nasty gray dresses, but I'd like to finish the job properly.

I would like to try dying Aprons but I have not had wonderful luck dying cotton canvas so far. I had asked for advice a little while back because the material was so thick that the dye "rolled off"...since then I have been able to dye canvas bags and those cute wallet/purses from dharma but I cant do any real designs because of the thickness of the material...

Is there anyone here who has tried tie-dying aprons? Do they come out good? I just dont want to invest in another item if they dont come out that great or if I cant make any designs on them...

thanks!

~Elisheva
www.groovesters.

I have been having some problems with my squeeze bottles..or more to the point, the actual "squirt part". The new ones have a really small opening that makes it almost impossible for any dye to come out. when I get fed up and cut a small part off of the top to make the hole bigger, the dye comes out WAY too quickly. any suggestions?

~Elisheva
www.Groovesters.com

let me try this again now that I know how to post pictures...

heres some new pictures from my latest batch of bandanas and head scarves - plus some pictures from a sale I had the other night. I went a little nuts and cute and dyed around 130 bandana-ish items to get ready for the upcoming holidays here. Sorry about the very serious looks I'm giving, I was trying to look artsy! I'd love to hear some feedback!

~Elisheva
www.jobshuk.com/groovesters

heres some new pictures from my latest batch of bandanas and head scarves - plus some pictures from a sale I had the other night. I went a little nuts and cute and dyed around 130 bandana-ish items to get ready for the upcoming holidays here. Sorry about the very serious looks I'm giving, I was trying to look artsy! I'd love to hear some feedback!

~Elisheva
www.jobshuk.com/groovesters

(boy, I hope Im putting these pictures in correctly!)

[IMG]http://i258.photobucket.com/albums/hh270/DANGERUSLY/IMG_4559.jpg[/IMG]

[IMG]http://i258.photobucket.com/albums/hh270/DANGERUSLY/IMG_4560.jpg[/IMG]

My husband is just not nearly as fascinated as I am with these color gradations LOL... so thought I might share them here with other artists. I've started changing the way I do things and adding dye while pulling fabric out of the water slowly. I'm getting very nice results... smooth subtle color gradients that are just fascinating to me. I've got kind of a niche dyeing baby carriers and this one is for a customer.

I bought one of those "flag's" from dharma (you know, the one with the star on the top) and I have no idea what to do with it. I bought the smaller one so there isnt much room to play around with interesting folds like guitars and whatnot. Any ideas on what or how to dye it?

thanks!

~Elisheva
www.jobshuk.com/groovesters