Dye-Na-Flow Shibori

Last week I blogged about how I added a layer of stenciling using thickened dye paste  to my hand painted scarf.  Although it added more interest, it was too subtle for me.  It needed a darker value and some spark.  I decided to try a third layer using Dye-Na -Flow paint.  I wrapped the scarf around a PVC pipe (see below)  and painted it with Emerald Green.  It took only an hour or so to dry enough to unwrap. Put it outside and in ten minutes it was completely dry.  Ironed it up and I love it.

Printing on Silk Scarves with Thickened Dye

This year for the Guild Auction, I'm donating two silk scarves.  There are pictures of both in my previous blog post. Yesterday, I printed with thickened dye on the hand-painted one, thinking it needed more 'something' to add interest.

While I had the thickened dye, I found another couple pieces of fabric, one cotton and one other silk scarf and printed on them as well. I had not done any thickened dye printing in a very long time. I forgot how easy it is.  I had to make up a new batch of the sodium alginate, but that goes very quick. Since I wanted to print without pre-soaking the fabrics in soda ash, I just added a mix of soda ash/baking soda to the thickened paste and liquid dye concentrate.  There's a four hour life to the paste once soda ash has been mixed into it, so it's use it or lose it.

Here's the results: