Dye Experiments

Last month I got together with a couple friends for a fabric dying play day. I wanted to work on an idea that had been floating in my head for a while--how it would work to dye different already constructed fabric pieces vs. just flat yardage. Here's the results...



This piece is 100% cotton print cloth that I pieced then layered with a cotton batting and then ditch quilted. I soaked the finished piece in soda ash and then hung on the line to dry. A quick press with the iron and then I dye painted it. I'm quite happy with the look of the brush marks on this one.



This piece is of the same fabric but just not layered and quilted. I also like the look of this one.



This one I was less happy with, but it does have some potential. It's just a piece of the same flat yardage that I marked out a grid on with pencil.

I also painted on various small strips of fabric thinking that I would piece them afterwards, but there was a lot of fraying in the washout and I'm not sure the original idea would work. I've still yet to sew the pieces together so will show those when I do.

I'm not sure what I'm going to do with these. My thought was to stretch them on canvas stretcher bars and hang as a group of four. They all have 4" plain borders all the way around. Or maybe make pillows out of them or ??? Still playing around with ideas at this point.