All the pretty colours!
A couple of weeks ago I went to a tie dye day my friend was hosting. They are a regular occurrence at his house in the warmer months, complete with snacks and a barbeque. Due to their frequency and my love for bright colours I have a big stash of tie dyed fabric waiting to get used, along with maybe a third of my wardrobe being tie dyed! I have tried to be more mindful recently of this fact and minimise the amount of fabric I am hoarding but this tie dye day was special because I had a particular plan in mind- a tie dyed kimono!
I've been thinking and planning for this project for about a year and now things are finally coming together! I'm going to use McCalls/Yaya Han M7765 pattern and individually tie dye the pattern pieces in different designs and colours so it ends up being a glorious colourful feast for your eyes! This will be one of my most ambitious sewing projects and definitely my most ambitious dye project. Pretty much everything else I have tie dyed has been left up to chance, this is the first time I am planning out what I want instead of just making it up as I go along. I'm really interested in different methods of resist dying and with this project I want to combine Japanese Shibori techniques with the vivid colours associated with tie dye.
I haven't done any shibori previously so my aim with this tie dye day was to make some samples of the colours and patterns I want, before dying the final fabric. I don't think I will have time to complete the whole outfit in time (for Rainbow Serpent Festival at the end of January), so I am just focusing on making the dress and underskirt. I will make the kimono sleeve bolero next year sometime.
In the first picture you can see my illustration for the outfit, with all the different colours and patterns. I didn't quite stick to that plan for this trial tie dye day as I was inspired after looking through my friend's shibori book.
Starting from the individual photos the 1st (blue), 6th (pink red) and 7th (red yellow) pieces were created by wrapping the fabric around a pole and then tying string around the pole (arashi shibori). I achieved the different patterns by using different sized poles, folding the fabric differently and painting the dye in different directions. The large white patches on the 6th piece are because I overlapped the fabric too much when wrapping it on the pole and then the dye couldn't penetrate it.
The 2nd (blue green) piece was meant to be a willow leaf pattern (yanagi shibori) but I'm not sure if I did it correctly because it didn't come out looking at all as expected. The fabric is folded into a concertina, which is divided into segments. Every second segment inverts so the parts that are inside end up outside and vice versa.
The 3rd (blue green) piece was folded into a normal concertina and then wrapped with string down the length.
The 4th (red purple) piece was tied using the spiderweb method (kumo shibori). Each rough circle shape is pulled up from the rest of the fabric and then wrapped with thread. This one was very time consuming but looks beautiful, especially with the ombre effect.
The 5th (red yellow purple) piece was folded in half and then hand painted, rubbing the colours together to blend. It reminds me of doing silk painting as it is more direct and you can see how it will turn out instead of needing to wait for it to be unfolded.
The 8th piece was made by folding the fabric in half and twisting it into a spiral. The dye is then squirted onto the spiral like slices of a pie
The 9th piece was made by folding the fabric and then clamping pegs on top to leave a white space and create a kaleidoscopic effect (bojime shibori).
Everything turned out so well! I was really pleased with the results and can't wait to do it on the real fabric!
