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Some Fiber Reactive Dyeing

Some Fiber Reactive Dyeing

Comments 14 comments

The other Day I went over to my friend Elizabeth’s house To play with MX or fiber reactive dyes. these are the dye you use for cellulose fibers and silk. I had planed on doing some silk as I am low on some colours but I could not find my silk top. I know I have some but I do not know where it is hiding. Instead I took some flax/linen, hemp and tencel . I had never dyed any of them before.

Here is the dye set up, we are doing low water immersion dyeing.

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While I was doing fibers

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Elizabeth was doing small skeins. Experimenting for dyeing warps for her loom and to sell.

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Elizabeth is a “good” dyer. she measures and rights down how much of each colour she mixed and how much she used for each one. She will be able to reproduce what ever she or her customers would like.  Here are Elizabeth’s result. Various fibers: 2/8 and 2/16 cotton, 2/8 bamboo, cottolin and hemp/cotton.

Es dyeing

I on the other hand am a “bad” dyer. I just put a bit of dye in the water and wing it. That’s ok because I don’t need to reproduce the exact colour and shade again.

This is my result.

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Here they are with the undyed fibers, on the left hemp, on the right tencel and on the bottom is flax/linen.

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I did some close ups for you too. The hemp compacted a bit when I squeezed the excess water out. It fluffed up and softened when I shook it and gave it a wack on the table.

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The tencel got all crimpy. I was quite surprised.

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the flax/linen stayed compacted despite several good wacks on the table. I am not surprised really when yo spin linen you spin it wet. I think it helps it “glue” the fibers smoothly together.

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I think I will blend the fibers with some wool to try spinning and to felt with. It was a fun day with Elizabeth, It is always good when you are sharing with other fiber lovers.

Dyeing Some Silk Hankies

Dyeing Some Silk Hankies

Comments 16 comments

I was running out of dyed silk hankies so it was time to brake out the dyeing supplies. before I started anything I had to soak the silk Hankies. They do not like to get wet the way silk fabric does. They really resist. I soaked them for 24 hours in some water with a little soap.

I used MX dye and a low water technique. I smooshed the silk in the bottom of some small containers form the dollar store.

silk ready to dye

Then I mixed up some dye in little measuring cups using only a small amount of water. Just enough so the silk will be covered after I add two colours.

dye for hankies dye sticks

I added the dye and let it sit for about an hour at room temperature. I mixed up some PHup ( the stuff you use for pools, sodium carbonate) 1 spoon full for each cup of water used in the dye and the water you are mixing it in. I poured some into each container and let it sit a while longer, about 15 min.

hankies dyeing

I then rinsed them in room temp water and then some soapy water then clear water. One was to much all one colour so I did a spot dye.

spot dyeing

And here they are drying on the table.

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I will use them  for surface design on hats and pots and to make flower designs on surfaces by folding and twisting them. you can layer them or stretch them out thin. You can spin with them too if you like.

If you want full instructions on low water mx dyeing I learned about it here http://www.pburch.net/dyeing/lowwaterimmersion.shtml

 

 

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