Is it possible to lighten the color of black silk lace enough to accept purple dye?

Name: Danielle

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I need purple lace for a dress I will be sewing. I have found some antique black silk lace that I really like. Is it possible to lighten the lace enough to accept purple dye since I know I can't use bleach? Or do I have to keep searching and find white lace instead?

Thanks!

Please do keep searching and use white lace instead. While it is often possible to safely lighten the color of dyed silk using a sulfur-based dye remover, such as Rit Color Remover, or Jacquard Color Remover, it doesn't always work. The sulfur-based dye removers are much kinder to the fiber than the damaging hypochlorite in chlorine bleach, but the results of using any color remover, including bleach, will not necessarily be light enough in color. Some dyes simply cannot be removed at all, and there's no way to predict what will happen with any commercially-produced lace, since you have no way of knowing what kind of dye was used in its manufacture. There is a significant chance that enough color will remain, no matter what you do, that you won't be able to dye it to a pure clear purple. You can try removing the black dye in this lace, and it might work well, but you shouldn't expect that the results will necessarily be good.

I am sure that some fans of antique lace would like me to point out here that a true antique should not be subjected to either color remover or dye, but that really does depend on the value of the lace.

If you find some lighter-colored lace to dye, be sure to find out for certain, before you buy it, what its fiber content is. The fiber content makes a huge difference in what kind of dye you can use. Rayon (of the viscose type we call rayon in the US, not rayon acetate) is easy to dye with the same dyes that work on cotton, such as Procion MX dyes. Nylon can usually be dyed with another kind of dye, called acid dye (it's named after the mild acid, such as vinegar, which is used with it); it does require heating in a non-aluminum cooking pot. Polyester is more difficult to dye, since it has to be boiled for an hour with a special type of dye called disperse dye; ordinary dyes that work on cotton or silk will not work at all on polyester.

Dharma Trading Company sells some easy-to-dye cotton lace trim. Since at least some of it is on clearance sale now, I'm not sure whether they will be continuing to carry it, but they still have a good selection at the time of this writing. Look at their page at the following link: Dyeable Cotton Lace Trim. Since this lace is made of cotton, it will be extremely easy to dye with fiber reactive dyes such as Procion MX dyes, which are extremely wash-resistant (unlike all-purpose dyes such as Rit), and are easily set with soda ash instead of heat. You can use the tie-dyeing recipe with any color (or colors) that you like.

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Posted: Friday - July 01, 2011 at 09:42 AM

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Is it possible to lighten the color of black silk lace enough to accept purple dye?

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