Chapter 6: Colouring Materials - part 2: Colouring Synthetics

Synthetic Materials

Day 3 continued:

I don't intend to complete all of option 2 from this chapter but there are parts that I am interested in exploring. While I am waiting for the six bags of experimental colour and the three bags of plain fabric to soak in their dye mixture I will experiment with a small selection of synthetic materials as these may add dimension to the surface texture of my work. 

Being in experimental mode I set away some cotton fabric soaked in white vinegar with rusty bits plus a bag of new washers wrapped in it. This needs at least two days to get a decent result. I actually left the fabric in its bucket for three days as I was out for the day and couldn’t attend to it. After thorough rinsing then soaking in saline solution to reduce acidity – it is drying in the sun. The marks are well developed across the fabric, there is good colouring for my stitched samples.

Markals applied to cotton fabric in yellow and green over the egg shell rubbing plate to create some textured fabric for working into. I gave it background wash of lemon yellow silk paint. That will need two days before it is dry and can be used. I ironed the fabric between sheets of silicon paper, to set the paint. I am not 100% satisfied, some of the paint has melted into the fabric, but there are still lumps on it. I am not sure how still will stand up in a piece of work, if lumps are what is required that will be OK, but if not it’s a bit of a mess!

Applying colour and texture to fabric with Acrylic Paint

A4 sheets of Pelmet Vilene painted all over with dilute acrylics.  The background colour did not take very well, so I mixed stronger colours (less water).  The colours were sprayed / brushed onto silicon paper and the Vilene laid on top to absorb the colour, more silicone paper on top while the paint was still wet, then ironed – this created interesting patterns as well setting the colour ready for use. The colours are quite subtle but do have interesting marks on them.

Thinking about applying colour and texture on fabric, I used two more techniques with acrylics. Using two flat Perspex sheets, apply paint with a brayer liberally on the lower sheet, place second sheet on top then rotate. Carefully pull the plates apart to reveal interesting patterns. Immediately place a piece of fabric on top of the pattern to take a monoprint. Iron fabric when dry to set the pattern. Background can be flooded with very dilute fabric paint or silk paint ink, iron again to set the background colour. This has worked quite well but, care needed not to press the fabric down too firmly as it is easily smudged. I wet the fabric before applying the wash to get the acrylics to mix where two colours meet and overlap.

Another version of mono-printing with acrylics – apply paint with a brayer to the firm flat type of bubble wrap, then apply to fabric. Can repeat with different colours to build up patterns. Other textured surface can be used in a similar way. Washed with dilute acrylic paint.  I like both results as they produced very interesting patterns which could be used  in interesting ways with stitches, or be cut out and apply shapes or add stability for layering different weight fabrics.

Applying colour to non-woven synthetics

For my next experiment I applied colour to Lutradur, Tyvek and Bondaweb. The Lutradur I have is very fine weight. It will be a good medium to apply heat to it for added texture to my samples. In my stash of stuff are unopened jars of Colour Craft Metallics fabric paint in Silver, Copper and Turquoise (bought from a show, but never used…). Humm me thinks, will this fit in with my colour scheme? Let’s give it a go… Did the same on two weight of Tyvek and some bondaweb.

In dried form they look quite brash (the jar does say ‘will add a dazzle to your work’!). I was patient to see what happens when heat is applied to the samples.

The two types of Tyvek (middle image) with heat applied to show convex and concave patterns – this does create a bubbly texture which might be useful for interpreting texture in the stitched samples. The Lutradur and a piece or organza with heat applied, I was gentle with this as it can very quickly disappear. Again, a useful texture which could be layered and stitched through.

Applying colour to fabric with Transfer Paints

I have tried transfer paints before mixing the colours from the powders but had poor results – the colours were very pale.

This time using the pre-mixed versions in small jars so I knew the level of dilution should be correct. I painted some jazzy patterns onto printer paper with Turquoise, Scarlet, Orange, Lemon, Emerald Green and Violet colours and left them to dry.

Evaluation of transfer paints

Using a polyester satin fabric with matte finish. The outcome is not as good as I hoped. I was worried about the heat of the iron on the polyester, so started at a warm level then increased the heat as nothing was happening. I timed how long I ironed the piece and it was five minutes of circulating the iron over the piece of A4.  The above image shows the violet reproduced well, some of the small red dots have come out well – the paint was quite thick for these, but all the other colours are pale versions.

Similar heating routine to that above.  For a piece of voile the resulting colours are even paler than on the satin. This may be OK if this is for a panel that need a high degree of transparency, but it was a lot of work to get to this stage. I’m glad I tried the transfer paints again, but for me they are not worth the effort, and they are expensive.

Printing directly onto fabric.

Feedback from Sian suggested I should try printing my digitally enhanced images directly on to fabric for stitching into. To make the print colour fast, I soaked white cotton in Bubble Jet 2000 liquid. When dry, ironed it to freezer paper then put it through my printer at a high-resolution setting.

The results are good and ready for stitching. With this version the colour and detail are well defined, but the background is very bright. I will have to put a bondaweb backing on to it then applique it another fabric. Next time I will digitise some of my coloured textured papers and print a whole sheet for stitching into.

The disadvantage of this method is that the background around the object may need to be transparent, so the image may need some more digital tweaking before printing. Also, in the home environment, the print is limited by the size of paper the printer will cope with.

There are professional services that can print onto fabric with designs; for example, Laura Kemshall - https://weprintyoupaint.co.uk/about-custom-digital-print/

Day 4: Evaluation of Experimental Dyeing

Up bright and early to start rinsing the nine bags of fabric and get them out to dry. The fabrics had been in their bags for at least 36 hours. It is another schorchio day up north! It’s only 9.00am and it’s already over 20 degrees, reminds of early July 1976!

Overall the results are an amazing collection of coloured fabrics. Within all the bags of fabric there is a great variation in the extent of dye uptake which has produced some lovely patterning across each piece of fabric. For those fabrics that may be too pale, this is OK as I can either over-dye the fabric or use it as a background for printing onto.

I don’t mind having the variable results as these have provided points from which I can learn. For example: Was the water too hot when mixing the dye powders? - This can cause the dye to work too quickly and not produce good results when adding later pieces of fabric. Am I still putting too much fabric in the bags for the amount of dye? Are the bags too small for the amount of fabric? Had the dye ‘gone off’ overnight?

All of the fabrics included in the bags are ‘natural’. However, for each of the single colour plain fabrics (Ultra-Marine, Turquoise, and Orange) I added a some sinamay and some sisal fibres to see if they would take the colour.

For each of these bags of single colour the silk velvet took the dye in the strongest most even colour, with the cotton, silk noil, scrim and cotton edging doing quite well, but with quite a bit of variation. The silk mawata hankie has some lovely colour bits round the edges but also some patches completely undyed. The linen scrim, scrim and cotton added after one hour are very pale. The sinamay and sisal took very little colour. This does mean I have a range of shades (tones?) in complimentary colours for use in my work.

For the dye family experiments – I was really pleased with the results of the Emerald Green and Violet dye mixes. From Ruth’s book the suggestion stated each bag was to have 25ml of dye added, with a variation pre-mixed from each of the two colours.

Bag 1 was a mix of 23ml Emerald Green + 2 ml Violet

Bag 2 was a mix of 20ml Emerald Green + 5 ml Violet

Bag 3 was a mix of Violet (in first) 15ml + Emerald Green + 10ml

On the second addition of dye (see previous post for why I did this…) I doubled the quantity of dyes added to each bag and left the dye to work for another 24 hours. Now the fabrics are ironed, I am very pleasantly surprised at the result – but having looked at the photos in the book, I’m not sure if this is what was expected – the examples shown seem to be much more even and more vibrant. However, my painted colour swatches on paper show a subtle colour and in my results the fabric colours are quite subtle, which is why I think there may have been a problem with how I mixed the dyes or how much fabric I put in the bags. The variations are superb, producing lovely effects. I like the way the colours have split so that the green and violet can be distinguished in different tones. What is surprising (to me) is that from bag 1 and bag 2 the violet is very subtle, almost a grey colour, so unexpectedly I have created a pale grey for my colour scheme. In bag 3 I had a spare skein of silk thread and this has taken the colour variation very well – so an excellent result.

For the Turquoise and Lemon mix – I was very surprised – I have worked with this colour combination before so was expecting very vibrant results.

Again, for each of the bags, 25ml of mixed dye was required, and I doubled this on the following morning. The original quantities were

Bag 1 22ml Lemon + 3ml Turquoise

Bag 2 18ml Lemon + 7ml Turquoise

Bag 3 3ml Lemon + 22ml Turquoise

The results are more subtle than I expected and not such cool colours. I would class the green from Bag 1 as a warm green so what has gone on here I do not know. All my fabrics are usable so I am not upset about the variation I have achieved. However, this exercise has taught me that much care is need when mixing the dyes, particularly temperature and how long the dye sits around before applying it to fabric. The ambient temperature outside is very warm at present this may also have affected the uptake of the dye. What is clear is that dyeing fabrics can be unpredictable so one must embrace serendipity, or just keep practising until one becomes used to working with the right quantities of fabric and dye.

(Note added later – I went back to my notes from when I used this combination of dye before, and the quantities of each colour were different, I am not so surprised at the result after all. I also feel vindicated that I did write down the quantities previously even though someone called me nerdy for doing so! Thank you Sian for reminding us to keep up this good practice!)

Day 5: Preparing the Colour scheme board.

I how have a good range of different natural fabrics and yarns in a range of colours that match my chosen image. I will probably use the Tyvek, Lutradur, coloured bondaweb and pelmet Vilene but not the synthetics from the transfer paints. To have some bold colour I have augmented my fabrics with a few commercial synthetics, such as satin and organza, and the contents of a couple of ‘experimental bags’ from Oliver Twists that include things like wool tops, throwsters waste, carrier rids, Angelina fibres, wire and so on.

Putting together the board was great fun, but a challenge on what to leave out. Because I have such a range of colours to use, I decided to use a dual colour background – an idea I might use in my stitching samples. This allows me to use complimentary colours to set off the subtle as well as the bright shades. The orange satin is perfect for the bright blue, turquoise and purple/greys. The darker shade of dyed blue fabric, is good for the orange and orange/turquoise mixed fabric as well as the lemon tones of the lemon turquoise mix.

I am now looking forward to using this colour scheme for the next section where I can start putting my stitching ideas onto fabric.

Chapter 6: Colouring Materials – part 1 Dyeing natural fabrics and yarns

Coldwater, fibre reactive dyes.

I have done some basic dyeing in plain fabrics before using the tray method and the plastic bag method.  This time I wanted to experiment and extend my practice by using different methods to achieve a combination of colours in my fabrics, rather than single colours. Using Ruth Issett's book 'Colour on Cloth', my first trial was layered dyeing (p.56) to produce samples with several different colour ranges in the cloth.

My chosen colour scheme was supposed to be from the stage two of my digitally enhanced images.  This has more blue in it than the stage four image used in chapter 5. Observation of colours in this scheme includes: Grey, Cobalt Blue, Turquoise, Mid-Green, Yellow Green, Dark Orange, Pale Orange. Mix 1 based on Orange and Turquoise Mix 2 based on Turquoise and Magenta

Day 1:

Using the recipe in Ruth's book I mixed Procion dyes for turquoise, scarlet, lemon yellow and magenta. I don't have a pre-mixed orange so had to test the mix of lemon and scarlet until I achieved the colour I wanted – using the white cartridge paper to paint a strip of colour, I came up with 45ml of lemon and 10ml scarlet. 

In addition I mixed Ultra-Marine and Emerald Green for later dyeing

Raiding my stash of neutral fabrics I chose the following to have different weights for stitching on: med-weight calico, cotton sheeting (new), cotton pillow cases (very old and well washed), old poly-cotton pillow cases, linen scrim, strip of edging from old cotton broderie anglais, various threads and yarns. All the fabrics were machine washed twice to remove surface dressings, then soaked in a solution of water and dissolved soda crystals.

I packed the fabrics and yarns into plastic containers, poured over the colours; orange and turquoise in one, turquoise and magenta in the second container, then poured on additional soda solution.  The fabrics were left overnight for at least 12 hours.

Day 2:

In the morning very little seemed to have happened to the fabric,there were too many undyed patches on the fabric – this was disappointing.  What went wrong?  Was there too much fabric for the amount of dye?  Had I been too quick to add the soda solution? Had I added the extra fabric too soon?  I still had plenty of dye pre-mixed, so spread the fabrics in a tray and dribbled colour on to the undyed patches.  Gently scrunched the fabric together left them for 15 minutes then added a bit more soda solution, returned the bundles to the containers and left them for another 12 hours.

This time the results were a great success.  Shown below fabric drying, then ironed and folded with thread and yarns:

The second trial was based on Ruth's method for colour families (pages 69 – 71).  I mixed the Emerald Green and Violet dyes and more of the Turquoise and Lemon dyes  to work through the examples suggested, and following the instructions more carefully, set  six bags of fabric away… 

Colour family dyeing with swatch cards of what should be produced!!

Day 3:

In the morning the results of the colour family dyeing were not very good, so more mixing of the colour combinations specified and left them to work the magic. I think I must be putting too much fabric in the bags for quantity of dye used.

Overnight I had been thinking about chapter 7 and how I would add texture and stitching to my fabrics to make them more interesting. Fortunately I had good results with the mixed threads so have a good selection for stitching and couching.  But I do need some plain fabrics in the basic colours to mix in with my beautifully patterned fabrics.  Out with the dyes again, and three more bags of fabrics set away in Orange, Turquoise, and Ultra-marine.  This time I have included some silk noil, silk velvet, silk hankie and sinamay as well as the cotton, scrim and calico.

I have transfer dyes in my stash of stuff bought at shows (but never got round to using them before!) so will attempt colouring pelmet Vilene, Lutradur, Tyvek and other synthetics to add to the collection.

Costs of materials

I didn't have to buy any materials directly for this work as I already had dyes, fabrics and yarns in my stash.  However, if I were replacing them I would have spent over £100 based on these are approximate costs:

Item	Supplier	Quantity	Cost
Procion Dye starter pack & Transfer Dye pack	Art van Go	1 1	£15.95 £18.95
100% 300 count cotton sheet 200x180cm	Asda	1	£12.00
Scrim (150cm wide) *1 @ £1 /m	Empress Mills	5	£5.00
Med. Calico (150cm wide) *2 @ £2/m	Empress Mills	5	£12.50
100% Egyptian 440 count cotton bundles @ £6.50	Empress Mills	4	£26.00
Various neutral threads *3 skeins @ £1 each ~20m	Adelaide Walker / Airedale Yarns	20	£20.00

My friend and I buy bulk supplies of fabric and yarns at various shows to share for our textile work. These have been used as needed. The cost above are calculated from the bulk outlay.

*1 I Bought a 50m roll £45.60 (Inc. vat)

*2 I bought a 50m roll at £123 (Inc. vat) both to be shared with a friend

*3 we bought several large cones of neutral fibres to be shared I have used an average of £1 per 20m skein

In Part 2 Results of further dyeing, evaluation and summing up

Chapter 5 Colour Study–Part 5 Colour Grouping and Summing Up

Colour Grouping

For the exercises above I referred to my colour mixing charts shown below  for selecting colours in my image (cool/cool, warm/cool, warm/warm).  As it happens all are from the cool/cool range so all belong to that group.  Then separating into three more groups.  I used the papers coloured with the dilute acrylic paints for Group 1, comprising  pale yellow-orange; yellow-orange adding more vermillion for the deeper hues, then vermillion & cerulean for the deepest hue. Variety in the surfaces was achieved by stacking the papers on top of each other while wet, or sploshing less dilute colour onto different areas.  My draining board left some interesting marks on the paper on the bottom of the stack .  Dilute Brusho used for Groups two and three.  Spraying lemon then turquoise for the pales yellow-green, then gradually adding a touch more turquoise.  Different tones also achieved by adding more water to the paper before spaying.  For added interest I added salt to the layers (Yellow-Green through to dark blue-grey range).  The pale blue-grey areas of group three were the most difficult to achieve – the base is Payne's Grey (slightly less intense than black)  at different level of dilution, then by adding a separate mix of magenta and turquoise for a purple hue to the mix.

All the base colour used are from the cool side of the spectrum, and in my photos below I have ordered them from palest to darkest.

I made six small sample books grouped by technique:  Thai silk tissue sprayed with Brusho. Waxed Thai silk tissue.  Papers sprayed with Brusho, sprinkled with salt.  Papers washed with dilute acrylics.  Painted pages embossed with patterns (some over printed with colour). Samples of the Cocoon strippings silk paper.

Group 1:  Yellow, Orange to Red Violet range	Group 2: Yellow-Green to Blue-Green range	Group 3: Pale Blue-grey to darker blue-grey range
Colour chart 01 cool/cool colour mixes	Colour chart 02 cool/warm colour mixes	Colour chart 03 warm/warm colour mixes

Colour Circle

I have done many colour circles in previous courses, so do not feel I need to complete this exercise.

Colour Exercises

Top row:  Colours ordered by Tonal value Then bottom row:  Having studied the window from image four carefully I ordered the colours in the amount present, starting with the most from left to right:  1) Mid-green, 2) deeper shade of mid green, 3) yellow-orange, 4) orange, 5) very pale red-orange. 6) red-violet. 7) Violet. 8) pale yellow-green. 9) deeper shade yellow-green.   10) blue-grey. Unfortunately the colours have not reproduced well, the background paper is white.

Weaving papers together.  I chose colours that contrasted well with each to highlight the differences.  As a bonus, the other side of each paper also contrasted well.  Unfortunately the colours are not shown as bright as they are in reality.

Coloured strip on a background colour similar to one of the snippets. In this exercise I used a different colour background with snippets of each of the colours from window four.  I only repeated the exercise three times as I was running out of similar coloured papers.  Because the background is the same as one of the blocks this has the effect that none of the colours really stand out from each other.

Papers on contrasting backgrounds I didn't have enough of the exact colours for the final exercises.  the first image shows a selection from my window four papers set on black.  The contrast here is much better than a similar colour. Image two shows a pink background paper with a blue-green painted paper slotted through to provide a strong contrast, image three is the reverse on two. Making Papers Coloured Papers Throughout these exercises I used the coloured papers I made on my messy days.  Although I have already depleted the stock somewhat, I can spend another day making more of them.

Summing Up

I spent about six full days on this part of the course.  This was mostly because I spent some time playing with digital enhancements on the computer to get some suitable colour images, then quite a while making surfaces to work on and quite a few of the techniques needed advance preparation.  I have also spent the time writing up notes on the blog, preparing the photos to go with it and, presenting it in my book. 

The work from my messy days created many different coloured sample areas - far more than the ten I expected to do from window four.  I made a list of techniques and media I could use, but have not made samples from them all – this is something I could pursue further another time. For example, I could have used the fabric paints, these would give different results from that above.  I really enjoyed making the different surfaces to work on, as these provided some lovely textures, especially when two or more colours were layered together. Although I found that It is difficult to achieve the exact colour I expected, serendipity has given me a massive new selection of papers and some fabrics to be used later.

Health & Safety for Colour

Number 1 – Wear rubber gloves when spraying paint on pages! – I don't always do this and when using the Brusho my hands were very stained and took several hours of hard scrubbing to get them presentable again.

Number 2 – Read health & safety information regarding pigment powders, gesso, other surface applications - wear a mask if required, work in a well ventilated room.

Number 3 – Work in an area suitable for messy work - cover surfaces with plastic for easy cleaning.

Number 4 – Work in a well ventilated room when melting wax – have a well padded surface (with for example,newspaper)  to absorb surplus wax – ensure trailing wire from iron is out of the way.

Number 5 – When cutting papers etc, use scalpel with care. Keep sharp point embedded in a cork or similar.