Where can I buy Direct Dyes online?

Name: Johil

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Dye polyester and poly/cotton blends

Country or region: New York

Message: I want to buy direct dyes for cellulose fabrics, but I can not find a link on this site that leads me there. Where can I purchase these dyes on line?

There are several US sources of direct dyes, which are used on cellulose fibers, in the small quantities required by individual dye artists. The most inexpensive would be the Industrial Dyes at Dharma Trading Company, which are sold in one-pound packages, which works out to just under seven cents per pound of fiber to be dyed. Of course, like all direct dyes, their washfastness is poor, as direct dyes tend to wash out relatively quickly, but after-treatment with a cationic dye fixative, such as Retayne, solves that problem, although with some loss of lightfastness.

Dharma Trading and many other dye companies, such as Blick Art Materials, also sell products made by Jacquard Products, such as iDye. Regular iDye is a direct dye, while iDye Poly is an entirely different type of dye, the disperse dye that is used only on synthetic fibers such as polyester ands acrylic. (They can be mixed to dye poly/cotton blends in a single boiling-water dyebath.) The color selection is much wider than for the Industrial dyes, but the cost is correspondingly higher still, at $2.69 to $3 for 14 grams of dye powder, enough to dye 2 to 3 pounds of cellulose fiber. That works out to about a dollar of dye per pound of fiber dyed, a dramatically higher price; fourteen times higher, in fact. That's significantly higher than the best deals available for the much superior Procion MX fiber reactive dyes, which, from some suppliers, cost as little as 40¢ for enough to dye one pound of cellulose fiber, if you buy half-pound jars, or 56¢ if you buy two-ounce jars.

Aljo Mfg, in New York, sells a wide range of direct dyes, for prices that are lower than the prices of iDye. You must call or write them to order, as they do not yet have an online ordering system. Their selection is good, and their prices are reasonable. Since you are in New York, this is probably your best choice. If you are in New York City, you could even go to their store at 49 Walker Street in Manhattan, instead of ordering by mail as most serious dyers must do. In either case, please tell them that you heard about them on Paula Burch's dyeing site.

PRO Chemical & Dye, in Massachusetts, used to be a good source for direct dyes, but they have discontinued selling their line of Diazol direct dyes. Cushing sells both acid dyes and direct dyes, if you can find them in a retail outlet, but it is impossible to determine which exact dyes they sell, as they do not reveal the color index numbers (just like Jacquard Products with their iDye line of dyes), and they say that both their direct dyes and their acid dyes are intended for use exactly as they are sold, without mixing any colors together. Aljo is the only source I know for appropriately small quantities of direct dyes that will also let you know the generic Color Index Number for their unmixed direct dye colors. (All dye sellers keep the composition of their proprietary premixed dye colors a secret.)

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Posted: Sunday - August 01, 2010 at 10:50 AM

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Where can I buy Direct Dyes online?

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