life, friendship and the itinerant stitcher

spent all weekend stitching and drawing up threads. well almost as i also kept convos with Velma and Jan almost chat like real time. fun!
then i went on DUH! mode.

tell you a secret.

the weaving here was supposed to collapse as you can see in the foreground. i had applied some alginate resist to the background so that i could get  unfelted parts, but it did not work. the intention with  the mokume was to replicate more or less the effect of the collapse in that vast dense expansion that resulted from the alginate misbehavior.
however  i hit a roadblock when thinking about the dyeing. how was i going to keep the sides from dyeing? i could block them out with cling film, but that was surely going to add some patterning and i wanted the sides in their  pristine akane color .

stitching creates such a space for thinking!
i remembered a post by Joan about working with thickened natural dyes. i also remembered  that i still had kakishibu which would give me the soft golden brown i was after.i could thicken it with alginate and brush it on the gathered folds..
now if that isn't  double DUH...

i just have to tie the gathered threads tightly and brush the kakishibu.
such happiness visited today along with a crisp clear fall morning! i know now i'm going to get not only the effect, but also the color i want .

weaving wise i have already tied 150 little knots. i feel incredibly accomplished :).i might even treat myself to some chili spiced chocolate from lindt

 plus  there has also been a lot of activity over at artfire during the weekend helping the new people get settled in.

neki desu

some thoughts on dyeing

a silk skein is seeping in the murasaki dye.  another one will be steeped in alum for the second time. the difference,not a banal one, between seeping and steeping is that of temperature.

which brings up questions. if the dye is not rendered  permanent is it well dyed?

there is a certain expected fading, we all fade.desirably fading should be achieved with grace and elegance.

but if the dyeing is not properly done  it would be a dis service to handmade and i would be playing in the h&m and zara league  with a huge disadvantage.

if i chose to make things by hand it was to honor a certain way of doing ,of respecting times and procedures. and personally i would feel uncomfortable asking money for something that will not hold up, that albeit being  handmade it would be use and toss.

i tend to side, for more than the obvious reason, with the japanese way of  natural dyeing. letting things rest for a period of time and slowly building on them.  for example, the woven scarf  in the image was woven last  april and the dyeing took place between may and june and then put to rest to let the color develop.

now i'm stitching a mokume pattern and then overdye the woven scarf  with either logwood or walnut and put it down to rest  again.

i could and do resort to synthetic dyes if i need/ want quick results . i have no problems with that. but i feel that in  natural dyeing other parameters rule.

 what are your thoughts on the subject of dyeing and permanence? and of natural vs. synthetic dyeing?

have a good weekend!

 

 

neki desu 

oh elation!oh rapture!

the alcohol steeped chips with distilled water gave me this interesting liquid.it is not transparent and has an almost  solid translucent quality. ok.ok., the photo has some added texture, but the color is right.

 the silk skein was scoured and while still wet dipped for 30 minutes +/- in ash lye water. then dyed for 45 minutes starting on cold and slowly rising the temperature without letting it boil. then cooled in the liquid and then hung outside to dry.

i was gratified this morning with the color it took. ouchiiro!!.

dipped the skein in ash lye water  again and will do a second dip today. meanwhile i'm mordanting a skein of very textured silk with alum and will use the murasaki liquid in the other jar.

what i've learned so far:

• alcohol extracts much purer color than water soak.

• it also extracts more color than water so it is more cost/time effective.

•  color extraction with water gives a lot of yellowish- brown color. the purple coloring matter tends to stick to the container so it is wasted.

i think i'm going to devout time to murasakizome.i could become a specialist as  it is much less frustrating than indigo. i can't imagine myself becoming a specialist on something, the ever jack of all trades :D

 

neki desu