I can no longer enter quilts into the competition since I am considered a professional because of my few sales here and there, so,I decided to make silk shibori scarves. I had purchased a pretty one last year at the Brookfield Craft Center and I had done a fair amount of shibori dyeing with good success, but I had never done it with silk.
This is the scarf I purchased last year. I liked its neutral color and have worn it quite a bit because it seems to go with a lot . It was my inspiration. I had a hard time deciding what color to use for the initial pole wrap shibori and eventually chose olive green, a color I had used before in cotton dyeing and had liked and I thought it would be neutral. I did not want to try and copy this scarf. I wish I had taken a picture before I over-dyed it, but it was quite ugly. The color separated into a yucky orange and green. To make maters worse, I dyed three scarves in the same color. What was I thinking?
What color should I use for the Itajime part where sections of the scarf are clamped and then dipped into another color? I chose chocolate brown with a little black added. I wanted a rich, dark color as in the one I had purchased. Instead I got this wishy-washy brown and the color migrated into the squares. When I had done Itajime on cotton the blocked areas stayed the original color. I used different circles on the other two and they are equally ugly. Maybe if I backed them with a fusible I could use them in an art quilt if I did a lot of stamping on top. Maybe.... Or maybe I could dye them black and use discharge paste or bleach to do a pole wrap shibori again. Maybe.....
Sooooooo, I made two more, this time using colors I like and was rather pleased with the results. I gave a lot of thought as to the color I should use for the over-dyeing and decided on a navy blue for the chartreuse. I had used navy before on cotton and it is a rich dark navy.
And this is what happened. The navy is very purpley and migrated into the squares. Not too horrible, but not at all what I had in mind. After this I decided to keep the turquoise shibori just the way it is and call this a lesson learned that silk dyeing is not the same as cotton and get on to another kind of scarf, this time totally different.
I think this one is a winner. I sewed strips cut from silk men's ties onto a lightweight cotton foundation and then backed it with fleece. It is quite attractive on, with the pretty silks facing out and the warm fleece against the neck. It should look good with my white down jacket.
All scarves are about 7" x 54". I'm linking up with Off the Wall Friday.
8 comments:
Your idea of ugly is probably because you had other expectations--I don't see much ugly here! Glad you didn't get the 3 feet of snow some of your neighbors did!
we didn't get but an inch or so instead of the 4 predicted. Of course they're now predicting 6-8 on Sunday.
How are you dying your scarves? The easy disappearing dye in baggies or the pain in the neck procion that requires so much rinsing out??
Leeanna
I like both of the last two scarves shown. You rescued the silk just fine. It would go really well with a black outfit.
I am sorry you are feeling frustrated with your 'misses'. It is frustrating when things don't go to plan, but then of course sometimes it goes the other way and we get wonderful 'hits'. I actually quite like the colours of your first scarf that you were so disappointed in.
As for getting 'just' 7 inches of snow - our country would grind to a halt with that! It is still relatively mild here with the odd day of sun where I can sit in the garden - all be it under 7 jumpers!
I have had that same problem dyeing silk!! I did a sort of mini-silk dyeing workshop that Betty Busby hosted a while back and as long as I stuck to bright colors (pink, turquoise, lime, etc.) it was fine, but the minute I tried for something darker, mud mud mud mud mud (when I was feeling polite and also some grosser descriptions when I wasn't)! Alas, clearly something I require more practice at.
Norma, none of these are ugly! But that being said, I do like the final one the best. It's very striking.
I probably shouldn't mention that it's been in the low 80s this week in Texas.....
If the photo is showing the true colors, I actually like the orange and green one.
I've found that the pure mx colors are the only ones that are the same on both cotton and silk. I do like how the over dye with brown turned out. Not as planned, but still lovely.
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