Pretties...

I have a new love. I know I have shown you some bits before but I am now so taken with dyeing its unbelievable. It is so unpredictable but so much fun. I only have four lots of dye powder to play with magenta, yellow, turquoise and black, but the colour range is amazing!
I spent the day playing Saturday. There were bags and trays of dyed fabric every where, all round the kitchen in various stages of manipulation and colour application. Most of my dyeing was colour mixing, quite tame but as I am new to all this, very exciting!

A rainbow of colours!

 I worked through the dyes gradually adding different measurements to create the range of colours. Some of them look very close in colour but they all had different quantities so I could see the change in the colours. I was very methodical, which is highly unusual for me, I wrote down every thing so I could in theory go back and recreate the colour if I ever wanted to.

When I had a vast quantity of bags of dye everywhere I moved onto some parfait and tie dye.

The first cloth I folded into a concertina then folded in quarters, I then secured it with cotton tied tightly around it. Then I painted on dye with a paint brush the colours mixed on the cloth.

I should have taken some photos but I was far too excited! I will just have to do it again for you!

Concertina folded

The next one is my favourite piece, the colours have mixed really nicely and the shapes are quite striking.This  I folded into a concertina then triangles and secured it with spring loaded clamps. I then applied different coloured dye with a paint brush around the edges. 

Triangle folds

Parfait dyeing was next. Magenta, yellow and turquoise, its so unpredictable. You could use exactly the same colours, fabric and jar and have a completely different effect and colour range come out.

Parfait dyeing

My final piece was space dyed, I think that's what it is called. I placed the fabric onto a flat tray and puddled it in places then I started to add the dye splodging it on with a paint brush. I mixed the colours on the cloth with the brush and allowed it to dry in place so the folds would add some texture.

Space dyeing