Adventures in Dyeing

I've been dreaming of a dye studio. Picture a naturally lit workspace with a utility sink, stove, plenty of space for racks from which freshly dyed and washed yarn is hang drying. On shelves and in cupboards all the equipment and supplies from dye powders to dye pots is meticulously organized and a carefully developed library of colors is cataloged in a system that makes it easy to recreate any colorway I want.

But I don't have that yet. I may never have. So working with what I do I have and wanting to move on from food coloring as yarn dye I decided to invest in fiber reactive dyes. Fiber reactive dyes are great because while neither fiber reactive dyes or acid dyes are safe to use in the same space you prepare food and therefore require their own space and dedicated dye equipment acid dyes require heat to bind the dye to the fiber on the other hand fiber reactive dyes mostly just need time. This means wherever you do set up your dye space you won't need a heat source and you don't have to invest in dedicated cookware. Also, fiber reactive dyes work on both cellulose fibers like cotton and linen AND protein fibers like wool and silk though they behave differently on each.

I decided I wanted to use the CYMK system for developing my colorways. So to get started I ordered myself four dye powders from Dharma Trading Co.: Turquoise, Lemon Yellow, Fuschia, and Raven as well as the soda ash and urea I'd need to hand-paint my yarns. Then I bought myself a large folding table I could set up outside/in my garage, a jewelry scale for measuring, a large measuring cup, and a pack of 16 oz condiment bottles for dye stocks. I also went to my local pharmacy and got some 10 ml syringes.

Since N95 masks are a little hard to come by right now I have been using just a basic one and the nitrile gloves I stole out of my kids' chemistry set. Next, I grabbed some plastic wrap, some plastic spoons, and a couple of rubber maid containers. Just add some yarn and I was ready to go.

The yarn I bought was American Maid 8/2 cotton from Yarn Barn of Kansas. I like this yarn because unlike most cotton this is ethically and sustainably grown in the U.S.

I want to dye a color triangle eventually to better understand my dyes and how to mix them to get the colors I want but winding even the 5-gram mini skeins I decided to make my samples from took forever! And I was in a hurry to get to an actual dye project. So I decided to just dye 12 different colors, for now, my three primaries in 3 different gradations each as well as one orange, a purple and a green. I also couldn't wait until my table arrived either, so I used this rather beat up one:

Here's me and my assistant.

I did all the math ahead of time it was just a matter of measuring it out so having a four-year-old in the mix didn't perturb me too much. I can handle a couple of elements of chaos as long as I have everything else in order, and it was fun sharing this with him. I measured out the dye stocks with the syringe and then handed the syringe over to my assistant.

On to the main event!

For my hand-painted warp I decided I would make tea towels (or dishcloths? honestly what is the difference?) I wanted them to look good in my kitchen so I used my floral curtains as inspiration. I wanted a light sage green a nice magenta and some purple to all play together a bit, but not so much that it turned to mud. My warp ended up being divided into 4 warp chains just because that's how much I could easily warp on my warping board so I chose to dye just one of those chains in two different hues of magenta, one with just touch more turquoise in it, and the other 3 warp chains would have my light green and purple. I knew that since I hadn't experimented all that much yet with my set of dyes I probably wouldn't get exactly what I was picturing in my head but hey it was just towels. But I still wanted to go into this project with a specific goal in mind because I figure I will learn more by having a plan and failing than not having a plan at all.

Anyway this time I had a decent table to work on, the one I ordered having arrived.

Thankfully Little Girl decided to steal my phone and document the event.

Batching Drying Finished!

I'm really quite happy with the magenta warp chain. Is it magenta? or more of a maroon? I need to get better at color names. But while I was prepared to end up with something not quite what I had in mind the end result of the green and purple warp chains was less much farther off the mark than I had expected. The experiment was exciting and fun but in the end I had to decide if this was acceptable or not. I left the finished warp chains on my desk where I would pass by them frequently and after a day of that, I was sure I was not going to accept this neon green and royal blue monstrosity.

Overdyeing to the rescue!

Just added some diluted (I didn't measure) magenta dye stock to the purple sections and then I diluted the same dye stock even more before applying it to the green just to muddy it up a little bit.

Purple sections looking actually purple! Green is far less bright! The section in the middle was not planned but I think it's nice.

After washing and drying the colors are much more subtle.

Before and After!

I can't wait to warp it up. Wish me luck!