Veils!

Yes, I finally washed them and they survived (yay!)

They are so transparent It is hard to take good photos so here are some semi-decent photos of them being held by Horatio, the suit of armour dude. I have better pics of the designs of the yellow and pink veils. The yellow one was my first attempt, which I folded wrong but everyone still seems to like it. the pink/purple one actually turned out how I wanted it to- yay! I made it for one of my bellydance students (she hasn’t seen it yet but I’m excited to show her!)

I am having so much fun dyeing these veils- I have a few left to play with but I already want more!

Sidenote:  The red dye went nuts on me and wouldn’t stop squirting. My shower curtain is now light blue with hot pink spots… Oops.

Yellow/orange design detail (I’m about to re-dye this one now that I figured out how to do it right. It will be yellow, orange, and red).  It’s really alot brighter than it looks in the picture.

I made this one with the triangular folding technique in my new shibori book. This is how the yellow one was suppose to turn out but I folded it wrong the first time. I want to try this design with lots of different colors (I think it will look kinda keleidescope-y) but I made this for a student who wanted a pink and purple veil 

New pics…finally!

So I borrowed my friend’s camera and my computer decided to be nice to me for once. I’m updating some of the pictures in previous posts.

I don’t like having them GIANT on the posts so if you want to see a bigger, more detailed picture of anything just click on it and it will get bigger.

quilt

Book Summary- Shibori Designs and Techniques

Southan, Mandy. Shibori Designs and Techniques. Great Britain: Search Press Limited. 2008.

I found this book great not only because of the information in writing but also because of the wonderful array of color photos demonstrating and showing results of the various shibori techniques.  Even better was that every single photograph is an example from the author and artist herself, no models were used.  The contents of this book are mapped out in the contents and separated into quite a few sections: introduction, materials, dyeing, binding, hand painting and capping, stitching and capping, stitching and gathering, folding and board clamping, pole winding, pole wrapping, and an index.
The introduction explains what the term shibori means and that it is now used to refer to many types of tie-dyeing. The author discusses both traditional Japanese methods and more contemporary. She also shows some of her own personal adaptations to shibori techniques.
The next few pages of the book discuss materials.  The author suggests fabrics to use (she also suggests fabrics for each individual section/technique) and how to prep them.  She also mentions various inexpensive materials for use with binding and capping, and also different types of boards and clamps. It has a section on various types of poles and then finally other materials used such as irons, measuring spoons, sponges, etc. She does not forget about safety, that comes next! There is a list of safety items one should have as well as a disclaimer about the dye powder and other chemicals.
I found all sections of this book to be very detailed.  The dye section explains about reactive, acid, steam-fix painting dyes, discharge paste, liquid detergent ,and and equipment (buckets, stainless steel pots or bowls, plastic bags, electric kettle).  It then goes as far as to show step-by-step with pictures; how to dye using acid dye, cold water reactive dye, direct application, steam fixing (both on a wire rack and on a long pole), discharging on silk, over dyeing, and space dyeing. It even has a color wheel and suggestions of what looks best next to each other.
The binding sections discus various ways to create shapes using bound beans and/or string. It also mentions capping (with bound beans and with stitching) and explains (with more photos of course!) how to go about doing that.
The stitching and gathering section show various floral patterns, Mokume, and Karamatsu. Then the author moves on to discuss folding and board clamping methods. It shows both square and triangular folding techniques, sekka (folded flower or snowflake), and folding and clamping with direct dyeing to create kaleidoscope-looking pieces. In this section it also shows how one could use discharge with board clamping.
The next sections deal with pole winding and pole wrapping. The book shows short pole winding with direct dyeing, dyeing and discharging, two ways to do pole wrapping, and then another section where the fabric was wrapped on the pole, binded and pleated before space dyeing.
Overall this book was impressive due to it’s wide array of techniques mentioned, explanation of materials, and the stunning photographs.  The finished pieces shown in here are inspiring and the photographs shown in the tutorial sections are very helpful, especially for visual learners like myself and many other artists.

Dreaming of silk shibori…

I really want to learn to dye silk.

However, it’s harder than I expected and I’m terrified of my veils once I get them wet- I’m afraid I’ll rip them because they are only 5mm (great for dancing, bad for ashley’s sanity) . Also, I’m not sure if I can put them in the washing machine… My husband votes yes but if I do it and my veils rip I will be heartbroken!

From what I read online, I think I need some sort of  alginate (?) or something like that… because what I don’t like is how the dye just spreads all over the place because the silk is so thin. I want cool patterns that you get when you scrunch the cotton… and I also hate how the silk sticks together when it’s wet. I guess I’ll get used to it but I wish I knew what I was doing!

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Anyway, I’m in love with this gal’s veils>> Shibori Borealis

Someday I want to be good enough to make veils like she does!

(one of my favorites and something I really wanna learn how to do… LotusRising veil)

Series from Fibers I