Hand Dyed Fabrics

Thinking about my fabrics for the tropical art quilt I experimented with different ways of colouring and dyeing pieces of cotton and calico. These are small samples that I recorded in my sketchbook and include cotton dyed with silk paints and salt crystals, shibori on silk, tie dye on cotton and calico with batik wax trailing and silk paints

Spaced dyed cottons and threads using cold water dyes















Calico with hot batik wax spooned on
Marks made with a fork
Coloured with copper metallic silk paints

















These are early experiments with batik wax
I'm pleased to notice that I've improved the technique
a fair bit since these early samples!













The patterns were made by scratching into the wax with a fork













Cotton dyed and salt crystals added to draw the dye














More dyed cotton with silk paints and salt crystals













Cotton tie-dyed in yellow - I used a Dylon cold water dye















Silk dyed with a shibori resist - coloured with silk paints
















More cotton dyed with silk paints and salt crystals

Tie Dye on Silk

Tie dye using vibrant silk paints on silk. I tied the silk into bunches with lentils inside then, instead of painting or dipping, I injected the paints into the creases



























Silk that I spaced dyed with silk paints and salt crystals

Inspiration and Tie Dye

I gathered more things that relate to my theme: a Spanish stamp and an image from National Geographic






























I made some small tie dye samples. This one is silk paints on calico which I folded to resist the paints













This is a piece of silk tie dyed and coloured with vibrant silk paints. I love to use silk it has a beautiful sheen

Stitch resist

Tie dye with a stitch resist - I stitched a heart shape then ruched up the stitches tightly, tied the thread then dipped the piece in cold water dye


















There are lots of different ways of resisting dye or paint - gutta, wax, tightly tying round objects, pegging, pinching, clipping, folding (concertina style), scrunching and ruching (ie. shibori)

Tie Dye

Tie Dye with Dylon cold water dyes on white cotton. I used different sized pebbles from the beach and tyed round them. I dipped each end in a different colour and love the bit in the middle where the colours blend