A wrinkle in the calico: Patterns on fabric

These are my samples of patterned fabrics.

1. Dylon dye plus cold fix

I used 450ml instead of 500ml to mix the dye, in the hope of making a more intense black. I soaked the fabric first so it was already wet when it went into the dye bucket.

I stirred the fabricfrom time to time for the first 10 minutes then left it for 50 minutes total, before rinsing and washing the fabric. The best and blackest blacks came out on the old bed sheet with the commercial fabrics achieving grades of grey. (NB all of the pictures in this post were taken when the fabric was newly unwrapped and very wet. Some that look black have ended up as grey.

Here we have tiny points of fabric gathered and secured with elastic bands. The next one shows tiny zig zag stitching pulled tight.

The first sample has been ruched over thick string then tied with rubber bands. The second was a scrumpled ball of fabric tied randomly with elastic bands.

The following are two of my favourites. Both are ruched on a piece of thick string. The first is tied off with a thick knot of string. The second is secured with elastic bands.

Sample one was folded first one way and then the other to form a square parcel of folded fabric which was then secured with rubber bands. The second was two points of fabric bought together and tied together with elastic bands.

Large bulldog clips at alternating angles down pleated cloth. The other piece is pleated cloth secured by rubber bands.

Grains of rice tied into the cloth with elastic bands. Then a piece of cloth bunched in the middle and tied with an elastic band, folded back on itself, repeated until no more folds could be made.

The two sides were stitched with running stitch then bands and string were used. The other is all four corners of the cloth folded in, then repeating this until no more folds could be made.

Bulldog clips holding 'v' shapes of fabric together. Followed by diagonally rolled fabric tied into three knots and further rubber bands added.

Arashi shibori:

2. Dylon black hand dye

I used 1.5l instead of 2l of warm water to dissolve the dye in order to try and get as dark a black as possible. The fabric was placed inthe dye bath dry. I agitated the fabric during the hour it was in the dye but not to the same extent as the packet recommended. When I was rinsing the items were squeezed to remove the dye (I did not do that with method 1). Once again some fabrics took the dye better than others. The old sheet worked best, creating a 'very black' black. There was less contrast this time and more grey instead of clear white.

Redyed circles - I took one of the cloths from the first batch that had been tied with rubber bands to create circles and did this again. It is not as defined as I had hoped but still is interesting and there is scope to experiment in future. I could use method 1 for both, making sure I do not squeeze the fabric when rinsing ( to avoid the dye seeping and taking away the contrast). I could tie large circles the first time then tie lots of small circles in the white areas, hopefully obtaining spotty cirles!

Here I tied the bunches around the edges with rubber bands and then put further rubber bands around the resulting tube of fabric.

I pleated the fabric and used alternate large and small bull dog clips

I tied the four corners together then added more bands as above

This one was twisted and tied into three knots and bands added to the knots:

This one was rolled and then twisted and secured by rubber bands:

Here I used a commercially printed black and white check fabric and ruched the fabric on a piece of thick string:

This piece reminds me of a piece of agate. I took three points of fabric and bound them together with rubber bands. Some were bound further down as well.

This was one from the first batch that I redyed. I repeated the same process from the other corner of the fabric. The fabric was folded along one edge (about a centimetre), then along the right angled edge - these two edges were alternated until I was left with a fat packet of folded fabirc then secured with rubber bands.

Here I took two rubber bands and secured the roughly pleated fabric so it had three sections of equal length. I then folded this into a 'z' shape and further secured it with rubber bands.