Maiwa’s Introduction to Dyes
Wednesday, September 13th, 2006This past weekend was spent like every weekend… elbow-deep in dye. But this time, it was with Maiwa’s ["Introduction to Dyes"](http://www.maiwa.com/symposium/w_intro_dyes.html) workshop led by Anne Babchuk at [Maiwa East](http://www.maiwa.com/stores/maiwa_east.html). For three days, we explored a variety of different dyes and dye application techniques from Procion and Washfast Acid dyes to the new-to-me Vat dyes.
We spent Friday evening looking at some gorgeous and intricately detailed textiles, many of them incorporating resist techniques — [shibori](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shibori), [bandhani](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bandhani_work), batik, and block printing… [Shibori (Japan)](http://www.shibori.org/) and Bandhani (India) are just other names for ‘tie-dye’ but the method in which the fabric is tied or folded and clamped can create some facinating patterns and textures.
Saturday was spent immersion dyeing cotton, silk and devoré velvet swatches in Procion MX. While the swatches were setting, we also learned some fold/clamp/resist/tie-dye techniques using plain old cotton fabric and Procion.
Our little group of three people dyed our pot a colour called “Dark Earth” — a mix of Yellow, Navy, and Scarlet — which was supposed to be an earthy, mossy green colour. The interesting result was that the silk swatches didn’t seem to take up very much of the Navy colour and turned out a rust colour! You can see the devoré velvet samples have rust backgrounds and dark green “foliage” — that’s because the fabric is silk-backed and the velvet pile is rayon! Interesting…
On Sunday, we switched from cellulose fibres to protein fibres and dyed silk and wool using Washfast Acid dyes — both immersion and handpainting on skeins. The group that wanted to dye a yellow ochre colour somehow got a gorgeous grassy green colour… probably too much turquoise!
But you can see from the photo above that one of the fabric swatches turned out a pale, pale shade. That would be silk-backed rayon satin… So the backside is a deep green but the “right side” of the fabric is pale green because rayon, being a cellulose fibre, doesn’t dye with acid dyes. You can also see the fluffy pile of 100% nylon that dyed a beige/brown colour in the same pot.
On Sunday afternoon, we started using vat dyes. These are facinating… they discharge dye (remove colour) from the fabric and then deposit a new colour onto the fabric. Also, the final colour does not develop until the dye is exposed to oxygen and allowed to oxidize. So when you are looking at a “red” vat dye bath, it actually looks murky green. Then when you remove dyed items and put them into a cool water bath, the colour starts to develop into red… like magic.
So in the photo above, the swatch that is predominately red is actually our Procion-dyed cotton in “Dark Earth” — we did a rough accordian fold on the fabric, tied it in a couple places with ikat tape (I _love_ this stuff) and then dropped it in the red vat dye bath. In places where the fabric was exposed to the dye bath, the green colour was removed and red was deposited. The opposite happened in the other swatch — it was originally dyed a cranberry red using Procion and then dropped in a green/turquoise vat dye bath. It results in an effect which just seems impossible!
And finally, check out what else went into the vat… a pole-wrapped (arashi shibori) silk scarf. Again, this was silk that was dyed in Procion, [tied to a pole to create little accordian folds](http://entwinements.com/blog-mt3/2006/08/pole_wrappingnew_dimension.html) and then dropped in the vat dye. Since I’m going back to Maiwa East in two weeks for the natural dye class, I left my scarf there to dry. Once it’s dry, the silk will retain the texture of the accordian folds… I’m really looking forward to seeing how this turns out. Eeee!
The class was a wonderful overview to all things chemically dyed. Processes like [vat dyeing](http://www.maiwa.com/stores/supply/dyes_vat.html), I normally wouldn’t undertake on my own since it involves lye (have you seen [Fight Club](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0137523/)?) and thiourea dioxide (really smelly)… in fact, we all wore respirators with organic filters for the afternoon session. So the workshop is a great way to experiment and see what you enjoy the most. In fact, coming out of this workshop, all I want to do is play with the [woven shibori](http://www.interweave.com/weave/books/Woven_Shibori/about.asp) techniques _a la_ Catherine Ellis…
And while I was dyeing this weekend, a big box of my handpainted yarns winged their way to [The Sweet Sheep](http://www.thesweetsheep.com)…
