A Shot in the Dark ......

Deep Blue Procion MX

Yesterday I was reading Jane Dunnewold's book Complex Cloth looking for inspiration for the RR fabrics. At the end of the book are projects to create complex cloth. I thought I would work through the projects but needed to hand dye some fabrics. The new fabric arrived on Wednesday but I only wanted to experiment and remembered I had some pieces of fabric left from my last dyeing session. I also remembered I had some dye solution in jars from my last dyeing session - that must have been about 4 weeks ago maybe longer.

I had nothing to lose so I popped a piece of fabric in each of the 3 ziploc bags and added a different dye colour to each bag. I couldn't remember if the fabric had been treated with soda ash so after 20 minutes in the dye I added soda ash solution to the bags. I left them overnight thinking the dye would be exhausted and the fabric would come out a washed out pale colour if they changed colour at all.

Turquoise Procion MX

This morning I went to the garage to check on my fabric and was really suprised to see the results. I have three gorgeous pieces of fabric!!!!!

Fuschia Procion MX

The fuschia piece in particular has come out really well as has the blue, the turquoise is almost solid colour despite it being scrunched in the bag. I was quite surprised the dye wasn't "exhausted" although I don't add the soda ash to the dye until later in the process but how long does dye last before it is exhausted? Anyone know? Although the dye solution was stored in the garage the weather over the past few weeks has been warm with the result the garage gets quite hot. It doesn't seem to have bothered the dye!

I am heading for the studio to do some discharging and other techniques to the fabric and will post my progress over the next little while. I need to overdye these fabrics, something I have never done before, so we shall see what happens. What fun!