Natural dyeing cotton

A close friend of ours got married final weekend, and obviously I wanted anything nice to put on towards wedding. Buuuut, we reside a long time from any semblance of a mall. This is a blessing and a curse…on one-hand, we are never ever lured to cost Target buying random things. Having said that, we can’t just cost Target and purchase a lovely maxi gown whenever we’re invited to a marriage. So, I decided that this would-be a great opportunity to develop my sewing abilities, and work out one thing rather than purchase something. I rushed off to the material store in town, hoping for a lovely spring-y colored textile to leap out and inspire me.

The sole fabric shop around here is a quilt store, which carries almost solely cotton fiber fabric in quilt-y habits, once you know what I mean. Not quite dress material. I happened to be experiencing only a little woeful until I spotted big money of 100percent organic white-cotton, plus it dawned on me personally that I could dye it to be whatever cheerful spring color i desired.

Using the white textile at your fingertips {luckily it was a very high quality cotton!} I went home and commenced my research about fabric dyeing, which was a completely new adventure to me. Not only did I want to make sure my finished product would be color-fast so that I could wash it and care for it like normal clothes, I also needed to make the dye from biodegradable and all-natural ingredients. I found this great blog post {on one of my favorite blogs! They have fantastic posts!} about utilizing meals to dye textile, which directory of natural dye resources, which lead me to pick Tumeric in hopes to quickly attain a bright yellowish shade. It turns out that normal material dyeing is obviously fairly simple, with fast and stunning results.

Products:

White vinegar {for plant dyes} or salt {for berry dyes}

Dye source of your preference

Big aluminum cooking pot {aluminum helps to set the dye in the fabric, for some chemistry-related reason I don’t fully understand. Just go with it.}

White or light colored fabric {natural fabric like silk, cotton, wool, and linen work best}

Rubber gloves

{My mom and I found all the supplies, besides the fabric, at the local supermarket in my Grandma’s neighborhood. So easy and cheap!}

Tips:

Wash and dry your fabric based on its type. Mine ended up being 100% cotton, so I washed it on cold and dried it on low. The point here's to get the starch out of the textile.

Once it really is clean and dry, simmer your fabric into the large aluminum pot for one hour in an assortment of water and vinegar {four parts water to one part vinegar}. The vinegar acts as a fixative. If you’re using berries as your dye source, use salt instead of vinegar {1/2 cup salt to 8 cups of water}.

{Isn’t my Grandma’s kitchen SO cute? A big thank-you to her for letting my mom and me do this whole project at her house! It was really fun to hang out and make something together!}

Rinse and ring out your material completely in cold-water until it not has the aroma of vinegar, and set it aside- still wet- whilst you prepare your dye bathtub.

Fill the aluminum pot with fresh water- no vinegar this time around- as well as heat it to a simmer.

Include your dye resource to it before the water is visibly tinted. We spread Tumeric into the water and stirred until it dissolved and I also could tell the color was opaque adequate to stain my textile. It had been about 1/2 cup of Tumeric. You’ll need to simply mess around with this particular, there’s no precise dimension as it is dependent upon how dark/light you prefer your textile to be in the end. You can dip a tip of your material in to the bathtub to test its power.

Let the dye shower simmer minus the material on it for ten minutes, and at the same time, connect your material in virtually any design you want with cotton fiber string. Where sequence is, the dye won't enter besides, making white or extremely light-colored areas for a “tie-dye” result. That is an optional step- you can just color the fabric without attaching it.

Submerge your textile within the dye bath and simmer for 15 min. Turn/stir the material every once in sometime to ensure it's not sticking and burning up in the bottom associated with the cooking pot.

After 15 minutes, turn off the heat and let the material sit in the pot for as long as you want {overnight if you want the deepest possible color.} I only allow mine remain for 10 minutes because i needed a soft, pastel color.

Take away the textile through the dye bathtub when you yourself have reached a shade that's about two colors darker than your desired shade, untie the string, wash with cold water and ring carefully until the liquid works neat and no more dye arrives. It'll lighten about one tone during rinsing action.

Hang the textile to dry, or place it within the dryer on “air fluff” until it dries. It will lighten about another shade because it dries. Today it really is prepared be made into whatever stunning creation you can easily think of!

My mother took over the project at this stage, as it was clear that my meager sewing abilities are not gonna cut it. She {without a pattern!} sewed me a lovely pleated, floor-length top with a concealed zipper into the straight back. THANK YOU, MOMMY! I looooove it, and it was perfect for the wedding!