Module 3 - Chapter 3

First I went through my stash  of thread to see what I had, and was surprised at how much I had.

Firstly the pinks - weaving yarns, knitting yarns, ribbons, ricrac braid, soft cotton, coton a broder, pearl cotton, rayons,  rayon machine embroidery threads, some hand dyed threads.

And then the greens - pretty much the same mix, but also some natural and synthetic raffia, and some very old cotton candlewick thread (the blue green in the top right of the picture, which I shall try overdyeing).

I couldn't resist putting them all together in a basket, and I added some green machine embroidery thread, which I realised I'd forgotten to add to the green threads.

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3.3.3

Since taking the photographs, I've found a pack of mixed threads, which I think I must have bought at Ally Pally last year - they are the perfect colour. I've also found some torn selvedges which I have added in to the pile.

3.3.4

Apart from popping some threads and some torn selvedges into the dye when I am dyeing fabric, I think I have sufficient here for the rest of the module. However, I am off to the Festival of Quilts in a few days, and I shall probably bring back something to add!

Then I turned my attention to fabrics, and discovered all sorts of things I had forgotten I had. Included in the piles are some of my own hand dyed cottons, chiffon scarves, some wonderful shot tafetta linings which I bought in a closing down sale for next to nothing, organza, net, silk dupion, and some bits and pieces that I have no idea what they are!

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I need to inject a bit more brightness into the green range, and a bit more variety into the pinks.

So next I sorted out fabrics and threads ready for dyeing. I shall be using Procion MX dyes, but I have only ever used them on cotton, so it will be interesting to see what happens.

Here are, in the left pile from top to bottom - silk noil, silk dupion, silk/cotton, silk organza and silk habotai. In the right pile from top to bottom - Empress Mills PFD cotton, Whaleys PFD cotton, cotton organza, muslin, polyester dress lining.

3.3.7

Now threads. Along the top from left to right - bias strips of curtain voile,  selvedge strips of curtain voile, 4 different weights of cotton thread.  At the bottom are a variety of textured yarns which I found lurking in the bottom of my "natural" box of threads, and I have no idea what they are, so it will be very interesting to see what happens when I dye them.

3.3.8

And finally, a couple of things for overdyeing. The top fabric looks like a piece of Laura Ashley curtain material, and I have no idea how it ended up in my stash. The bottom fabric is from first attempt at dyeing with indigo using scraps of curtain lining. The thread is the very old cotton candlewick thread which is lovely and thick, so I hope it takes the dye well.

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The Dyeing and the results:

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This batch of pinks are, in the left hand column, muslin dyed in three different colours. The middle one has been pressed, the other two haven't. In the right hand column, from top to bottom -

•  cotton fabric, fold and rolled, then one end dipped in magenta and the other in yellow. It's made a lovely stripy fabric.
• the next three are all cotton.
• silk organza
• cotton otganza
• another piece of cotton
• the polyester lining

3.3.14

The green fabrics in the left hand column are -

• the top three are all cotton
• silk noil
• silk cotton
• silk habotai
• the polyester lining

In the right hand column are the pieces that I over dyed.

I also made a couple of simple shibori pieces. They haven't worked too well - I suspect they were in the dye too long - but they will make a nice background for samples in Chapter 4.

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And finally, the threads that I dyed. Reasonably pleased with these, they have all taken the dye to some extent or other, and I'm particularly pleased with the candlewick cotton, which I overdyed with yellow.

Monoprinting on fabric

I used acrylic paint in the same colours as I used with the monoprinting on paper, and I didn't add any fabric medium.  I used the 10" x 8" gelli plate.

I used 4 different types / colours of fabrics - the first four are on the shot taffeta, the next one on a piece of dyed cotton, and the rest on undyed cotton. The last one is made up of all the shadow prints. Some of these have worked beautifully, others less so. I don't think the photographs do them justice.

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