I recently posted on Facebook about how some friends asked me to make patriotic inspired aprons for an event they were working. I noted that I needed to use a more traditional tie dye technique rather than my normal “ice dying” method. So why was that? Now I’m not a tie dye expert…didn’t go to tie dye school or grow up in a commune but I can share what I have found about traditional tie dye and ice dyeing. First of all with traditional dyeing you take the powered dye and mix it with water in a bottle, fold/crumble/tie the garment and then squirt the dye on the item to create particular effects. As the dyer, you are in strict control (well, if you are good at it) of how it is folded and where the dye goes. This way, you can essentially keep colors from running into each other or mixing (unless you want to). So for my friends aprons, they wanted red, blue and white so I needed to be sure they didn’t all run together because purple isn’t the most patriotic thing in the world. Of course that did happen some as you can see in the finished product but mostly “those colors don’t bleed” :)
Traditional Tie Dye Aprons for Paul and Patty Strasser
Now, with ice dyeing, the concept is similar but you have a secret weapon you use to create the most amazing designs. This magic tool is ice. So, you start off in a similar fashion…folding/crumbling/tying your garment but instead of squirting the dye onto it, you let the ice do most of the work. As you can see in the following pictures, the process involves adding a layer of ice on top of the garment (and I do use differently shaped ice cubes to alter the effects!) and then sprinkle the dye directly onto the ice. The ice breaks the colors down into their components as it melts (note: this is not a technical white paper about ice dye and since I am not a chemist, I’m leaving it at that level of specificity) So, if you put red and blue together to create a patriotic apron, you may end up with purple, red, blue, green and who knows what else. The outcome amazes me to this day.
The Process
I really feel like I’m not the “maker” of the garments I dye…the ice is….well and the dye. I am like a conductor who leads the musicians to create amazing things. And the sad thing to me is that I can see folks just walking by my booth at events probably thinking “yuck…tie dye, I’m no hippie”. But if you look closer, you will see that the designs that are created look more like impressionist paintings than happy swirls (not that there is anything wrong with happy swirls). So check out the collage of images below and you will see what I mean. I may dye multiple items in the same batch, but no two are alike. Some don’t even appear to be from the same colors! It is amazing. So, remember to “Look Closer”.
Batch One: Autumn Leaves
Batch One of this set I'm calling Autumn Leaves. These were the dyes used:
Here is what the batch looked like before and after the ice melted:
And here are some of the designs and pieces that came from this batch!
So with yellow, brown, and green we got a reddish burgundy color!
Batch Two: Love at Midnight
Batch Two of this set I'm calling Love at Midnight. These were the dyes used:
Here is what the batch looked like before and after the ice melted:
And here are some of the designs and pieces that came from this batch!
So there is no yellow in the original dyes but you can see it in the final outcome.
Pretty cool right?
Thanks for reading!
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