Tuesday 25 September 2012

dyeing drying


We really did have a delightful time with Christine yesterday. A select group, all enthusiastic, each with our own ideas and reasons for being there.

As you can see the workshop is a lovely place, full of light (much brighter than it appears in this picture), well set up and with plenty of space for being everything from very precise to making a mess. Rubber gloves are essential at least for some part of the day!

I had come with my pre prepared Shibori as I knew what I wanted to do with some of my cloth - still Harry and Connie's sheets by the way! (I really should get round to telling you about them). But I brought some along as well to play with as well.
One particularly contorted preparation took life, Pygmalion like, and marched across the table! OK, it's not quite Burne Jones, but ... maybe, a giraffe or two?

There were a number of other bits of tying, wrapping, rubber banding, kebab sticking and otherwise manipulating fabric. My final show of things ready for pots various looked like this
Because there were four of us and Christine there was room for more than two colours each, in fact there were a whole variety of dye colours to choose from once we'd all made our own colour decisions
And once brought home, rinsed, rinsed again, then run through a hot but not boil wash, all these varied colours and patterns emerged from the washing machine.

Kebab sticks folded randomly into fabric
purple in the pot, it has washed to a rather pleasant blue
I've included all my bits there, with apologies for the odd layout. I find Blogger a bit eccentric about where it puts stuff sometimes!
The stitched Shibori





folded, rolled then alternately
knotted and rubber banded

The linen took up very little colour

The silk, on the other hand, was delightful. These bits
were wrapped around the bit of blue pipe above

goldfish or autumn leaves
round acetate pieces each side of folded cloth,
elastic banded, not clamped



















detail

a faint hint of moon

crumple wrapped in a stocking

can you see the face peering out at the top?




layered whirligigs twisted and bundled into a fruit next
if you enlarge you can see the mesh in the outer corners






lolly sticks and fan folding then the triangles of the
other stitched piece. The stitches didn't show












and finally - the giraffe - explosions of green!

What delights for a day of fun.

Oh, and in the last class, Christine emphasised how important it is to clean your machine between each project
a bit of fluff
She was right

10 comments:

  1. Goldfish or autumn leaves - I see goldfish japanese style. What a brilliant exploration of colour and pattern. Looking forward to seeing what you do with them.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. mmmm, I like that Japanese style thought, what a fine idea. I suspect though that, with a Textiles City and Guilds starting in a month's time and these brilliant monthly workshops with Christine, I may accrue a large pile of "fabric to do something with one day"!! All to look forward to - which is a Good Thing.
      mind you , I may just disappear under a mountain of "stuff"

      Delete
  2. Looks like so much fun. Beautiful results! I really like that green.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Hi Susan, thank you for popping by. I really did enjoy these, had them all out again this evening for another look! it almost seems like cheating to get such lovely results. Now fro dong something with them ...
      I'm really enjoying watching your latest cloth develop, it's such an education. There's so much wonderful creativity out here!

      Delete
    2. Is always my problem too. I am always so cautious with such samples from things like this. I save them forever - but I am trying to do better.

      Delete
  3. I love these! I think my favourite is the stitched shibori.

    ReplyDelete
  4. What fun you had; lots of lovely pieces to enjoy and work with.

    ReplyDelete
  5. Hi, Kat. Came over from Spirit Cloth. Love the dyeing results and I've enjoyed viewing your embroidery projects which are really lovely. I especially like the experimental nature of them--very exciting stuff!
    best from Tunisia,
    nadia

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Hi Nadia, welcome to my blog, thank you for popping over to say hello, and thank you for the complements. I'm really enjoying these experiments with colour and cloth, all to learn and fun to have!

      Delete
  6. Hi Ember and Anna, many thanks popping over and for some lovely comments. I'm really looking forward to the next workshop now with more experiments.

    ReplyDelete

Thank you for your comments, it's always a pleasure to know people have found my little corner of the webiverse. Don't forget to "prove you're not a robot"; so I can see your comment :-)