Adventures in textile design

After taking a course in textile design last semester I've been enamored with creating my own wearable art pieces. I've done quite a bit of eco dyeing, started up my own indigo vat and dabbled in fabric painting with procion dyes mixed with a sodium alginate solution. I also did some screen printing and while I do love me some prints (especially novelty ones) I was more drawn to organic looking pieces and the fact that I can make each piece one of a kind. I was dyeing something almost every day and then I just...stopped. I can't tell you why I stopped (well, I could but it's a fairly long story that starts off with me being unhappy) I just did.

The past couple of weeks I've been slowly easing myself back into textile design. No boiling pots of vinegar water or letting indigo oxidize right now. The technique that I've been playing around with is fairly easy and non-labor intensive. I can get my projects started and then go and do some classwork. The hardest part about this dye process is letting the pieces cure for 24 hours. I'm an impatient person and I want to see my results now, damn it!

The pieces above were an experiment using some new procion (fiber reactive) dyes I ordered from Dharma. I wanted to see how they would react to both each other and the fabric. I'm pretty pleased with the results! I'm not exactly where I would like to be but that comes with more practice and learning to be more selective about dye placement. Less is more.

My favorite piece is the top one. For some reason I just adore the splotches of red mixed with black. I know for certain that that piece will end up as a throw pillow on my Etsy shop. The amethyst piece is also gorgeous. Blacks turned grey and they mingled with the amethyst I got a gorgeous deep purple. The amethyst piece will end up as two pillows, two zippered clutches and maybe a few organic lavender sachets. Stay tuned.

Here's to hoping that the project I started this morning turns out half as well. I have some pieces of various types of cotton going along with a white button down and a large cotton gauze scarf curing. Once I get this technique down I plan to dye at least 5 yards of fabric for my department's "Fashion Redux" competition. The San Diego History Center decided on the 1950s this year which, if you've seen my racks of vintage clothing, is my favorite era of fashion.