Space Dye

I've been Space dyeing fabric today.

I have used pieces of calico, scrim and a linen mix. I know from previous experience that I will get a range of toning colours to use in my projects.

The fabrics needed to be washes and soaked before I started to do anything else.

Procion dye.
Make sure you wear gloves when using this!

I mixed the procion dye in a tablespoon of hot tap water. I began with the yellow and added differing amounts of blue to be sure that a variety of green shades would be made.

In a different container I dissolved the salt. Then I combined the salt and dye mixtures.

The fabrics were scrunched and laid in a shallow container and the different batches of dye were poured over the fabrics and left to soak for a couple of hours.

To fix the dye you need to add soda ash which you can buy online. However, washing soda mixed in water works perfectly well too and is readily available in the supermarket ... and really cheap.


Finally the fabric needs to be rinsed until there is no longer any dye seeping from it. I tend to wash it by hand but there's no reason why it couldn't be put into the washing machine.
Now I just need to wait for the fabric to dry and I can use it.

I have thoughts of leaves in my head ... so watch this space and see what happens when I add some thoughtful threads!