Ese's book - Part 3

Now that we've got the fabric dyed, our next step is to convert it into bookcloth. To do this you have to attach rice paper to the back or wrong side of the fabric using WonderUnder. The rice paper prevents the glue from seeping through the silk when applied to the book board. Take a look:




Once you've got your bookcloth, you attach it to the book board as you would with any other book. This book offers simple instructions on how to do that. Once you've attached the cloth to the board, secure your text block (which you sewed up while the fabric was dyeing) into the cover and place under a press. Voila! You've got yourself a custom made book. Here's the final product:



What do you think?

Ese's Book - Part 2

Today is part 2 of Ese's awesome book. :) Last night, I learned how to embed photo albums into my blog, so today's tutorial is a little flipbook. It goes through the pictures a bit fast, so don't hesitate to hit pause if you need more time to read the captions and look at the pictures. In the tutorial, I explain how to prepare your fabric for a second dye bath in order to yield a tortoise shell pattern. The result can be either subtle, as is the case here, or stunning (like Kristen's scarf) depending on how you choose your colors. I love this pattern. I think it's really beautiful.

Check it out!!

Ese's book - Part 1

I have a good friend named Ese. She loves tortoises. :) Her birthday is on March 12th and she's asked me to make her a thick journal with a cover that reminded her of tortoises. After giving it much thought, I felt it was only right to dye the book cloth myself. I started out with silk crepe, which I dyed using both Ecru and Bronze.

Although the water looks very dark, the color is actually very soft and warm.

After dyeing it the base color, I ironed it out dry to prepare it for the second dye job. See how beautiful it turned out? It's neat because the end paper I chose is almost identical in color and texture to the cloth. I think it'll turn out very beautiful.

Tomorrow I'll show you how I fold the cloth in preparation for the second dye bath (in black) and the end result, which will be the tortoise shell pattern.

Stay tuned!

Summery silk

Had a bit of extra time a couple weekends ago and made my sister-in-law a silk scarf. She's into orange and pink combinations at the moment, so those are the colors I chose. After making the scarf, I reeeeeally wanted to keep it. :P (That wouldn't have been very nice, though)

It turned out really nice! I love how the tortoise shell design has the blurred edges.

Deconstructed screenprinting-Before and After

Gotta love deconstructed screenprinting! This image is from a plastic placemat. I laid it down on some newspaper, screened over it with print paste, let the screen dry, and then used purple print paste to screen the image onto the scarf. It's a temporary image on the screen, unlike when you burn the image on in regular screenprinting, but it gives great results. I'm very happy with the way it turned out. I didn't expect the image to be so crisp.

Last night, I over dyed it with blue to finish it up.

The blue really makes the purple pop, doesn't it?

This scarf will be up at the White Walls Gallery of the Corcoran Gallery of Art for a while. Afterwards, however, I may put it up in my shop, for anyone interested...

Cool new stuff and screenprinting

Picked up this really great tablecloth from a local store here in Takoma Park. It was on sale for $19. I can't wait to have a studio with work tables so I can use it! It's a bit too small for our kitchen table.

I also got this cute door hanging. It's a row of soft little hens. It jingles softly when you open the door.

In terms of new projects, I'm working on a set of napkins! I first made a positive and negative image using black and white paper.
I then transferred that image onto a transparency and burned the image from the transparency onto a screen. Finally, I silkscreened the image onto the napkins, which I had previously dyed. Ta Daa!
I'm thinking of doing more with the napkins, but haven't quite decided what yet. Since this was my first go at screenprinting, I was focused on that and forgot to think of what would come next! I definitely want the rest of the napkin to have a contrasting pattern as well, though, so they're not just plain khaki. Stains will show up very easily on khaki!

Although I'm going to be busy tomorrow having a blast at the Baltimore Craft Show (can't wait!!! I'll make sure to take lots of pictures for you), I'm also planning on doing a shop update this weekend to include my new scarves, so stay tuned! :)

Dye Pots III 1/2

The pole wrappings aren't quite dry, so I thought I'd play it safe and leave them on the pole for another day. I want those pleats to be nice a crisp. BUUUUUUUUUT, I did take a couple pictures that give you an idea of how cool they're going to be! Hee Hee :) The first one is the pink one with black over it and the second one is the turquoise one, with purple over it. If they feel dry tonight, I'll take them off the pole, and photograph them. But since I know a lot of people are anxious to see some results, (me included!) I did take some pictures of the green organza that I dyed along with these, remember? I sewed quilting grade thread in rows along the fabric, scrunching as I went. You just do a running stitch all the way across. I did that in two sections. Here's what it looked like partially scrunched up:

I then over dyed it with a darker shade of green, removed the thread with a seam ripper (if you wait until it's dry, it's a lot easier), and ironed it flat. It's a very subtle pattern, but I think it would make a nice lining for a bag. I've been itching to make totes and bags for my shop using hand dyed fabric, so this green organza may be just the push I needed to get started. Anyway, here are pictures of the final result!

Pretty, isn't it? :) What fabric colors/patterns do you think would go best with this lining? Any suggestions for the outside of the bag?

Dye Pots Part III

Hope you all had a good weekend!

On Saturday, I dyed the pole wrapped fabric from my last post. I dyed the turquoise one purple and the fuschia one black. Here's the process:

1. I soak the pieces in warm water for about an hour. This ensures that the dye will penetrate all the fabric it can reach, not get stuck along the way because the fabric is dry.
2. I then put salt and dye in warm water and stick the poles in. I leave it for about 20 minutes or until I get the darkness in color that I'm looking for (keeping in mind that it's always lighter once it's dry). I sneak peeks every now and then to see how the color is setting:

I then add the soda ash to set the color and leave it soaking in the dye for about an hour (a bit longer for black). Make sure to set the timer!

3. This is always a good time to make yourself some tea. You've got a lot of waiting to do and since it's pole wrapped, there's very little stirring to occupy your time.

On Saturday, I chose some Japanese genmaicha. MMMM. :)

4. After having the poles in the dye bath for about an hour, take them out and rinse them in cold water first. When the water is clear (no color is bleeding) gradually rinse in increasingly warm water until you're rinsing in very warm water. Because my colors were so rich, and also because I wanted to keep them on the pole so they retained the pleats, I decided to soak my poles in clear water to make sure that all the excess dye was gone.

You can already see the water turning pink on this one!

5. After all the excess dye is removed, I wash the fabric with Synthrapol. You can also use a soft dishwashing soap like Dawn.

6. After washing the fabric, pat dry with a towel (don't use any nice ones!) and set out to dry. If you don't care for the pleats, just remove the fabric from the pole while you're rinsing and washing it and iron flat. This is also very pretty, but I wanted to keep the pleats so I have to be more patient. I checked the poles this morning and they're still damp, so I think they'll be ready sometime later this week. When they're dry, I'll remove them from the poles, take photos, and let you all see what all the fuss is about!

I can't wait to see them!!

Dye Pots Part II

I decided to pole wrap my turquoise and fuschia pieces from yesterday. For both, I folded them in half and then in half again and placed them diagonally on a PVC pipe. I then wrapped warp thread around the silk until I got down to about where it is on the pole above and then started scrunching the silk up the pole. I wrapped more warp thread and scrunched again.

I keep doing this until I get to the bottom of the fabric. If the silk folds over or bunches up a bit on one side, I just keep right on going because those folds are what give the shibori later much more character.

Here are the poles all finished. Sorry for the darkish photo.

You can see the pretty folds in this last picture very well. Mainly towards the bottom. I think this piece will turn out nice. It's such a pretty pink and with black on top? Beautiful! But I don't want to jinx it or anything, so let's just see what happens.

I'm planning on dyeing them this weekend, so stay tuned for before, during, and after photos!

Dye Pots

Spent a day this past weekend dyeing fabric. I'm not sure what I want to do with it yet, but I knew I wanted some nice colors for Spring. Here I've got a turquoise dye pot, a green dye pot, and a fuchsia dye pot going. I think I'd like to over dye the green with a darker shade of green to get an organic grass look. That'd be pretty. Then the fuchsia one I might over dye with black, but I'm not sure about the turquoise one yet. Maybe purple? Any suggestions?

Here's the finished fabric. I love the way silk crepe shines!

On a completely different topic, last night I got home after a rather long and stressful work day and was surprised with an AMAZING Valentine's Day dinner!

My husband went all out. He made us salads with walnuts and avocado dressing (yum!), steaks au poivre ("with pepper" - double yum!), and chocolate pudding cakes for dessert (yum! yum! yum!). All accompanied by some Ravenswood merlot. My mouth is watering just thinking about it! I was so excited that I didn't even THINK about the camera until it was time for dessert. So here it is, the only picture I got: a candlelit hot chocolate pudding cake with the melty middle. MMMMMM!

Kurt put raspberries and almonds and cinnamon on top to make it extra good! I already can't wait 'til next Valentine's Day to eat it again! :)

Thanks, baby, for a great Valentine's Day!

Happy Valentine's Day!

I hope everyone is having a good Valentine's Day. Kurt and I are celebrating it on Saturday, actually. It's madness here in DC on Valentine's Day. Let's just say that some friends and I were going to make reservations for a VD lunch and the set prices were $175 A PERSON! This place is not that good either. I'm sure it'll be back down to $12 tomorrow! They just take advantage, don't they?

We have tickets to a Jean-Yves Thibaudet concert on Saturday so we're going to make it a total VD date with dinner and all! This artist is the pianist who played the music in the movie Pride and Prejudice, my all time favorite movie! I can't wait, I'm so excited. :)

Kinda flaked on these heart pin cushions, didn't I? Just ended up making this one. It's super cute, though. I hand dyed the fabric a vivid pink, sewed some black felt on the back and then embroidered the black border. I was going to make a few to put on my Etsy shop, but never got around to it. I'm definitely still interested in making pin cushions for the site, but the goal to get them done by today was obviously not attained! Oh well. I just get distracted with so many other projects!

How are you spending Valentine's Day?