Wednesday, May 18, 2011

Dye Day

Change of plan. Was going to be doing a dip dye, but switched over to marbled wool. Needed some reds, red/oranges for the New York Beauty rug I'm working on, so I experimented a bit.

Here are a few of the pieces I got:


These two pieces came from a layering of goldenrod, deep red, and natural. The red bled out just as I hoped. Although I don't have a photo of the red, enough of the color bled leaving the red washed out in certain areas. Beautiful mottling.

I think that in the past, I have not let my marbled bundles cook long enough. These probably simmered for close to an hour. This is how they looked when bundled and ready for the pot.

The first bundle is where the two pieces of wool shown above came from. The second bundle on top gave me some lovely purple and blue blends. The third bundle was achieved using the following method.

Step one: I got together some deep red worms, a piece of light blue wool, and a larger piece of natural.


Step two: I scattered some of the red worms randomly over the natural strip.


Step 3: I laid the light blue strip over the red worms.


Step 4: Add more red worms on the light blue.


Step 5: Roll into bundle. I used a rubber band to hold the wool in place. You can also use string.

All three bundles went into the pot together. I did put a weight on top to keep them down in the water.

Here are the results of the two pieces marbled with the worms:




A fun time!

2 comments:

Kim said...

Gorgeous wools. I love the marble effect you achieved with the red worms.

Julia said...

Great marbleized wool. Thanks for sharing your dyeing job with us. JB