dye

After the Disaster: When It All Goes Wrong

| ellenanneeddy

I like to think I know what I’m doing in my studio. I do know better.

Every so often something happens that just can’t be helped. Sometimes it ruins a perfectly good piece. Sometimes it transforms it.

I’ve been working on this piece for over six months. It’s taken time because it’s so large. Smaller pieces are easy to see, easy to feel secure about, easy to finish. Larger pieces take time.

I was having a problem with the moon. The Angelina fiber hadn’t fused well, and I was having trouble stitching it down. So I laid a corn starch stabilizer over it and stitched it down. It was fine until I poured water on it to dissolve the stabilizer.

I hung it up to dry. I didn’t realized what had happened until I had looked at it for some while the next day. There’s really only one Procion dye that bleeds after it’s washed out. Fuchsia is the stuck pig of the dye world. Dyes mixed with fuchsia also can bleed. Almost everything else is dye fast after it’s washed out. But there was fuchsia in the background.

original owl
owl with bleed

It bled. It bled into the owl stitching itself. I bled too. Then I figured it out. The sunset was now in the owl’s face and wings.

I’ve always argued that art has a life of it’s own. It lives past the artist. It is shown places the artist can’t go, does things an artist can’t do. And it has it’s own problems.

Sometimes life changes a piece. It’s has it’s own life.

I’ve decided that the bleeding is like sunset, coloring the stitching as light colors life. Is it what I planned. No. It’s what happened. But I suspect it’s a good thing. And it’s simply what has happened. It’s not finished yet. But it has been changed.

I considered telling no one. But I’ve always been honest about my work, warts and all. I actually think I’m pleased with it.

Spring Dyeing!

| ellenanneeddy

Years ago, I did a very bad thing. I had dyed fabric all day and I went to the pool. You don’t get pretty dye on yourself when you dye. And it all soaks through to the skin. You mix all those colors and you get brown. Mostly down your belly and your tits.

So I was walking around with nothing but a towel over my shoulder when a very kind person looked at me and said in horror, “You don’t have to put up with that.” I looked at her and said, “Actually, I do. I’m dyeing.” I did explain to the poor soul afterwards.

I’m a fabric snob. Sorry about that. I’ve been dyeing my own fabric for my projects since I was ten. It was Rit Dye and we won’t talk about the quality of the fabric, but I understood even then that someone else’s fabric isn’t mine.

Don’t get me wrong. I love prints. I can get drunk on color and add good design to it and I’m a sloppy drunk. You can tell by the cut bits of fabric on the floor.

But I want the colors and intensity of my fabric. And I really hate fabric repeats unless they help your piece along. I’m probably going to dye as long as I quilt.

With the stimulus check (Bless those congress critters!) I’m planning a dye day. I need a new batch for me, but I’ve always got space in that batch for someone who might like to order a box of fabric to choose from, or someone who wants something special dyed just for them. A batch of light source fabric in 3/4 yards? A selection of actually not boring browns. Some deep lake or pond scum fabric. All available.

I’ve also dyed cotton/hemp/bamboo/rayon clothes for people. There are those of us who should never wear white. There is inevitably a day when it is white no more. At which point, I dye it and wear it till the threads fall apart. I can do that for you too.

If you would to either make a general fabric order, or order something special for a project, let me know. I’ll dye for you.

The Miracle of Cheesecloth: Not Just for Turkey Anymore

| ellenanneeddy

I love sheers! I love the ability to have my background peak through the sheers to create the connection between background and an object.

But most sheers don’t paint or dye well. They are poly or nylon. They come in bright colors, but they have other problems. You can paint them in pastels. They don’t dye with fiber reactive dyes at all. And if you get your iron temperature wrong, they melt.

But cheesecloth does all that well! It’s all cotton, and woven loosely. And you can iron it on fry and it behaves like cotton.

You know cheesecloth. You just aren’t used to it in the sewing room. It’s an airy woven cotton people used to use to make cheese (hence the name). Or on turkies to keep the breast moist. You may have used it to make Halloween ghosts or Christmas angels.

But dyed, it can be any color in the universe. I include it in a regular dye batch and it dyes like a champ with fiber reactive dyes. And it washes out easily in your regular washer in a nylon lingerie bag.

It makes amazing leaves! The weave in the cheesecloth looks like the cells of the leaves and the stitching defines the color.

My favorite thing to do with cheesecloth is to make mushrooms. Child of the 60s that I am, they are a flora that fascinates me. And they are an excuse for eye popping color.

I do make them in batches. I’ll line up a set of mushrooms on a piece of felt, using Steam a Seam 2, pull out my brightest polyester embroidery thread and stitch up batches of mushrooms at a time, that I’ll use in many different quilts. The bright colors and zigzag stitch pop the the colors to a peak intensity. Now, who doesn’t want that?

What I did differently, is I made some smaller ones for pins and patches for my friend, Sherrill Newman who owns the South Shore Market in Porter, Indiana.

South Shor Market in Porter IN

I almost never make these available to people except as finished quilts. But she talked me into it. I made a small batch for her store. Some of the left overs I’ve put on sale on Etsy. They have pins backs on them, but if you wished to use them as a patch, it would be a matter of a moment to remove that with a seam ripper.

Hand dyed cheesecloth might just be the sheer you’ve been longing for. Bright, cotton, and beautifully texturized, it makes great flowers, leaves and ‘shrooms.

Noncommercial Part 2: What Are You Going to Do with All that Dyed Thread?

| ellenanneeddy

If you’ve been following my posts, you know I did some thread experiments on dye day.

Experiments are always just that. Might work, could work, did work, did not work. All information.

But I worked with threads that are NOT workable in a commercial teaching setting, largely because of the way they’re put up in manufacture. The best way to dye thread is in (reasonably enough) a dyers hank. That means it’s in a flat loop, usually confined by a paper label or by twisting into a skein. Do all threads come that way?

  • Sashiko thread
  • #3 pearl cotton
  • #20 pearl cotton
  • Frizzle
Definitely the weird stuff. But good though.

No. No they don’t. But since I’m not producing for class or for travel I can fuddle around with the weird stuff. The trick is to get it in the end into a form where you can get it on the machine. Between a ball winder and a swift I can hank up anything I like. (See Noncommercial blog post.)

Here’s some of what I tried.

# 20 Pearl cotton, dyed and undyed
Well, even I know that won’t work. But look at the colors. The thread and fabric are dyed from the same shades.

# 20 pearl cotton fits in the needle as well as the bobbin! Since the cone didn’t feed onto the machine I filled a bobbin for thread from the top.

I love the Frizzle I dyed!

Look at it as branches for a tree. I have the cotton string I dyed here too, but the frizzle definitely wins.

Do I love the new threads I dyed!
They are to dye for!

Will I experiment with new threads? Well there’s all that thread that didn’t arrive in time for dye day…. Stay tuned!

The Dance of Dye: Seeing Your Fabric Born

| ellenanneeddy

You’ll need to forgive the way I look. There’s nothing glamorous about dye day. Or really dye week. Prepping fabric, dyeing fabric, washing up, washing out and ironing are all really blue collar fun. You sweat and get messy. Never mind that I’ve missed my last three hair cuts.

My friend Lauren Strach used to come to visit, partially for dye day, but mostly for the day I ironed. Because that was the day the fabric came out of the mangle.

Hand dyed fabric is pretty. But like all of us, it likes to dress up. It’s nice hanging out to dry. But you really get to see it when it comes through the mangle, pressed, starched and pretty. It rolls out like a beautiful woman floating down a staircase.

Three pieces


Of course the real moment is when you get to see it with hand-dyed thread

Lauren is a fabulous fiber artist, who explores a number of styles, in amazing ways. You’ll find her work on Instagram.

I’ve been privileged to watch her work grow. And she would come and drool with me over the freshly ironed new hand dye. She lives in Oregon now, and I in Galesburg, IL and all of that would take a lot of arranging to do again. But I treasure the memory of watching her face as the fabric would roll out, pressed and precious. And the things she would do with it.

You’ll want to see more of Lauren’s work. It’s a journey in color, texture and joy.

You might ask why I was mangling in the garage instead of the new glorious studio! We had misbehaving mangles. Don found me a lovely mangle that lasted just long enough to blow black smoke and powder on the floor immediately after it was plugged in. We took it out and found that new amazing IronRight. It stopped opening and closing about five minutes in.

I had a long cry, and we waited a day to plug in my old mangle from Porter and she worked like a charm. You bet I sang to her!

This is Don companionably sitting on his mower in the garage while I ironed my fabric. He had to sit somewhere. Did I mention I really like being married?

I do dye fabric for others as well as myself. This was a good dye run, and People regularly ask me to dye what they want for a particular project. But I do have some fabric from the last dye run I would be willing to sell if there’s an interest. Contact me and I’ll set up a video phone conference if you wish to pick some out for yourself.

You can see the flower already started here.
ellenanneeddy@gmail.com
219-617-2021
1055 N. Farnham Street
true
Galesburg, IL 61401
USA

Noncommercial: You Can’t Sell and Experiment

| ellenanneeddy

One of the nicest things about my new studio is that it’s set to produce supplies for just myself. For years I’ve dyed pearl cotton. It’s beautiful and as a mercerized cotton, the colors are spectacular. But if I wanted to sell it to students I had to standardize it. I never could take the time to try different kinds of threads that didn’t come in a dyer’s hank.

Why? What’s the difference? A dyer’s hank is simply a looped ring of thread. It’s easy to dye it evenly. A twisted ball is much easier to handle, but it can’t be dyed evenly. You can move one to the other. It just takes to stinking long to do it commercially. And it’s hard to make every skein even in yardage.

Hanked Thread

So now that I’m not making thread for the general public, I can really experiment with threads that aren’t in dyer’s hanks: Sashiki thread, cotton boucle, several sizes of weaver’s pearl cotton, cotton hemp, and cotton yarn. It’s a bit heady. I’ve been stuck with one cotton thick thread. But the world is wide.

In light of that, I bought two thread wranglers and I’m wondering where they’ve been all my life. These are tools weavers, knitters and spinners know well. But not every quilter works with them. Unless you need to deal with thread. Lots and lots of thread.

Swift and ball winder

I’ve worked with a swift before, but this is lighter weight and much less bulky. This is my first time with a ball winder. I’m in LOVE!.

My 27 yard hanks of pearl cotton wind into a ball like these.

  • dye hank
  • index card lable
  • yarn ball

The swift holds the hank, while the ball winder winds it into a tidy little pull skein ball. I’ve slipped a bit of cardboard through the hole to keep it from unraveling.

Later this week, I’ll be dyeing thread and fabric for the first time in the studio. I’ll keep you updated on how the new winding tools work with that.

Everything Old Is New Again: Hunting Aging Appliances

| ellenanneeddy

The appliances that worked for Gramma still make a dyer’s life so much easier!

My new old mangle

I’ve been dyeing fabric since I was ten. I’m about to be 67. With all of that you’d imagine something must be learned.

What I’ve come to understand is that natural fiber was the default in the fifties. There really wasn’t much else. That being said, the appliances that worked then are perfect for people working with natural fibers now. The irons, washing machines and clothes lines of that time are set at the correct defaults for people working with cotton, flax, wool, bamboo and rayon.

A mangle is a rotary iron with a heat shoe. I can iron fifty yards of fabric in two hours on a good mangle. It leaves fabric perfectly pressed without needing to use the dryer.

Ironrite Mangle #85

I love my mangles, even though they’re fragile. At 50 years plus everyone’s wiring frays a little bit. Here’s a video of me singing to my mangle

I had one in the studio in Porter. We’d worried about it being in cold storage. It seems to have held up, but we found one that had been safely stored in some nice lady’s basement. Unfortunately when we got home and plugged it in on Wednesday, it made a satisfying “pmoof” noise and blasted black power on the floor. Exit mangle two.

I went home with Don, devastated. Three hours later he plopped a picture for another mangle, on ebay. It came home yesterday and worked promptly and properly. I am thrilled!

After a while you start paying attention to the old companies. Whirlpool was also Kenmore. I had two Thor Gladirons (talk about Vikings). The new one is an Ironrite.

Is there a difference?

Turns out there really is. I have a link to their add video. It features a terrifying view of women and men of the 50s. But it may be the most goof proof mangle I’ve ever seen. The shoe is in a safer place and divided in the center. They showed a woman working on blindfolded. I think it might maybe be safe with this machine

Ironrite video

Where do you find a mangle? There is a new version from Miele that is astonishing in every way. Price too, but I suspect it’s very nice.

Miele Ironing system.

At current prices, I’ll probably never know. But the old ones exist, saved from attics and basements and estate sales. Make friends with the old appliance people. People downsizing their homes. Ask around. If you are dyeing fabric you need one of these. I certainly do.

I’m hoping on exercising this new beast after doing my first dye day at the studio. Do you need some hand dyed fabric for your inspiration. Call me (219-617- 2021) or email me and we can set up hand dyed fabric just for you, mangled to perfection!

Well, I’ll Be Dyed!

| ellenanneeddy
Three Point Landing

One of the not-so-secret elements of my work has been hand dyed fabric. I’ve dyed fabric literally since I was ten. I was working with melted crayons and Rit. The result almost made my father cry when he saw the midden in the sink, but I’ve been hooked ever since.

Why? Because nothing starts better original art than original art.

With the new studio in place, I’m ready to dye. Well, almost. We still need to freshen up the wringer washer and test the new mangle. But I have a dedicated kitchen space with a drain in the floor. What more could a girl want?

I put up Three Point Landing because it’s so dependent on the fabric. It’s a one piece background with around 15 colors in it. The colors make it all glow, sky, water and waterlily. The background, just one piece of fabric, makes it all happen.

When I dye fabric for a particular piece, I usually dye three pieces for the one I’ll use. One can be backing and one can be accessory, perhaps. But all three of them will be different in lovely amazing ways. And if I’m lucky, one will be just right.

Are there commercial fabrics like this? Somewhat. Caryl Bryer Fallert does a line of fabrics that simulated hand-dye quite well. But it’s reproduced. Which means it’s not a one of a kind.

I always have some really beautiful fabric that I don’t need to keep. I sold it in classes to students, because it’s cruel to tell them they can have results like yours without giving them similar supplies.

But there are always people who come back for hand dye. It’s beautiful, The colors are vivid. it’s needle ready, starched and shrunk, and no one has a piece just like yours. Each one is unique.

My first dye run will be naturally smaller than usual. But I am taking orders for people who would like fabric. Fabric is roughly 44″ wide, mercerized cotton. It comes in yard, half yard, and yard and a half lengths. I can either send an assorted box of fabric, or hand pick for you from what you tell me you want.

The fabric has a light source in it, usually. Built in sun or moon light spots that drive the visual action of your work from the start.

  • You can see the flower already started here.
  • Light pours through greenery

  • Greys from black
  • browns from complementary fabrics

Even blacks, greys and browns are vivid and exciting.

But if you ask me, I will dye what you want to your specs.

Fabric is $24 per yard. I ask that you buy at least $48 dollars worth of fabric. I do pack each box with an extra yard or two so you can pick and choose. You can send back what you don’t want. If you buy the whole box you get an extra half yard free.

I will have some extra fabric from the run, but I recommend that if you want fabric, email me or call me at 219-617-2021 and I will dye especially for your needs.

I expect to by dyeing around April 24th. Who wants fabric?