Name: Elizabeth

Message: My son is having his 4th grade field day on Fri. Apr. 7th.  My friend and I dyed shirts using Rit dye.  We've already removed the rubber bands and tried to wash shirts off BUT THE COLOR is running off.  Please help us stabilize colors.

I am so sorry. This is a sad situation. All-purpose dye is a very poor quality dye when used with cool water. You should have used a cold water dye, such as Procion MX dye. It will be very easy to do this project next time, if you get the right dye first. In the future, always avoid all-purpose dye for dyeing cotton (or cotton/poly blends). Procion MX type dye can be purchased by mail-order, or in the tie-dye kits that are carried by many crafts stores. (Jacquard is the best brand; Rainbow Rock is okay; Rit brand tie-dye kits are not suitable except for hot water dyeing.)

Here is what you can do in order to make Rit dye work.

First, you must heat-set your dye. All-purpose dye is not a cold water dye. The best way to use it is by immersing the fabric in a pot with the all-purpose dye dissolved in 190°F water. (That is, dissolve the dye in water, bring it to nearly a boil, then add the tied fabric, then simmer it for half an hour.) The biggest drawback to this process is that you shouldn't reuse the pot for food, since Rit all-purpose dye is not food-safe. You will only be able to simmer a few shirts at a time, depending on the size of your dye pot.

If you have already applied your all-purpose dye to your fabric, then you must either follow the above method with additional dye, or you must steam the dye into the fabric. You can do this very much like you would steam vegetables. If you dampen your fabric first, you can wrap it completely in plastic wrap, thus (we hope) preventing the dye from contaminating your cooking pot. Use a vegetable steamer or other contrivance to keep the wrapped fabric out of the water at the bottom, for steaming. Apply the steam to the fabric with the lid on, ideally for thirty minutes after the water in the bottom comes to a boil.

Unfortunately, you cannot heat-set the dye with dry heat, such as in a clothes dryer or the oven; dry heat only works for fabric paint. Maybe you could set it by microwaving the shirts, first dampening them thoroughly and wrapping them in plastic wrap to 1, keep the shirts damp so that the microwave does not burn them up, and 2, to prevent the dye from contaminating your microwave oven. (Note that dry fabric in a microwave will catch on fire!)

Even after proper heat-fixing, all-purpose dye will always run a little in the laundry every time it is washed, causing the dye to be less than optimally permanent, and also ruining your other clothing if you do not sort carefully by color.

The best solution to make all-purpose dye more permanent, after heat-setting it, is to apply a commercial dye fixative known as Retayne. This is available only by mail-order or from your local quilting supply shop, if you are lucky enough to have a good one nearby. Other brands which work similarly are Raycafix, Dharma Dye Fixative, and Dyefix. You add these to a load of dyed items in the washing machine, with hot water; follow the instructions that come with the product.

I hope that some of this information will be of use. If you just want the shirts to quit bleeding, washing them in HOT water will remove most of the remaining unfixed dye. If you had time, I would advise you to do this and then start over with good dye, or even fabric paint.

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