Dyeing a wool sweater for an art project

I have been wanting to make a 3D assemblage using a blue wool sweater. I planned to felt the sweater so it needed to be pretty big so it would look "regular size" after felting.  I could not find a sweater that would work, they were too small, not the right blue, etc.  I finally found one I thought was the appropriate size, and decided to try to dye it. This was a while ago, and I forget what I did, but instead of a nice blue sweater, with was muddy blue with blotchy gray spots. Recently, since I still did not find a new sweater that would work, I thought I would try to fix the dye job on the one I had. 

I did not expect good results so I didn't take any pictures before or during the process. First, I soaked the sweater in water, and wrung it out (I did not want any dry spots, so the remover would work uniformly). I made a bucket of Rit Color Remover outside (it is stinky stuff). I just used one packet of color remover and about one and half large steamer pots of boiling water.  Boiling water and wool typically is a bad thing, but I plan to felt the sweater so I am not concerned about it felting/shrinking. I let it sit in there for about an hour, then rinsed the sweater in the tub in the tub. The sweater was now roughly a heathered oatmeal color.

For the dyeing, I made a batch of about 1/2 tsp of Jacquard acid dye Turquoise in a big pot of water (pot is for crafting only, not cooking). I have been using too much dye powder in all my previous acid dyes so I only used 1/2 tsp as I did not want a dark sweater.  I cooked it on the stove for about a half an hour.  When I took it out is was more greenish than blueish. So I made another pot of dye, this time using Sapphire blue. I heated the dye pot on the stove and when it was hot, I took it off the stove and set it in the kitchen sink. I then dipped the sweater in the dye pot. . I would dip about 3/4 of the sweater in the dye and lift it partially out again.  I did leave about 1/2 the sweater in there it sit for a bit.  I did this dunking a few times, then I left about five inches of the sweater in the dye pot (for maybe a half hour?).

I got a great ombre affect, the very top of the sweater is still the greenish color from the turquoise bath, and then it goes into a medium toned Sapphire.

I hung it on the line to dry that is why it has a line across it. I plan on washing it on hot in the wash machine so it will felt a little more and to rinse out any extra dye. I sewed one sleeve to the sweater body with wool, as this is part of the art piece I want to make.

Nuno felting, my work-around

In my last post, I tried nuno felting but I think my silk was too tight a weave to get it to work right.

I refuse to let the silk "win", so I used my trusty felting machine and machine felted the heck out of it. Take that, silk. I win!

I really wanted the silk to get kind of scrunchy, so I soaked the project in hot water and "fulled" it. In felting terms, I wrung out some of the water, then dropped/threw it in the (empty) kitchen sink quite a bit to help make the wool shrink. I win again!

It may not be perfect. I would definitely do things differently next time, but I was thrilled for it to be almost what I envisioned in the beginning. And I may short cut with the felting machine on another wet felting project I have in mind, too!

First attempt at Nuno felting

Earlier this month I had bought a bag of silk scraps and wanted to try Nuno felting (combining wool roving with silk fabric).

I kind of "winged it" and so the results are not spectacular.  First, I decided to cut silk circles. I did not think the wool roving would be able to penetrate two layers of silk.  I wanted the background to be wrinkled, so I pinned the fabric with wrinkles, outlined around my circles and then cut the background fabric.  (I took the pins out before putting the wool roving down).

I did not find a background fabric in the bag of scraps that would work, so I used Colorhue dyes to dye a piece of white silk orange.  I dried it with a hairdryer, rinsed it with water and a little soap multiple times, and dried it with the hairdryer again. Colorhue dyes are supposed to "instant set" but I must not have gotten all the extra dye out. As you can see, my mainly white circles in the top photo become orange after wet felting (see photo wayyy below).

I put wool roving around the circles,a fairly heavy application. I did a light application of roving over the background as I am looking for that bubbly fabric I have seen with nuno felting.

 The piece is on bubble wrap. I put a piece of tulle mesh over the piece, and I used some soapy water to wet the fibers. I rubbed gently with my fingers, then used my plastic roller to help with the felting

I wrapped it around a pool noodle and rolled and rolled and rolled.  Seriously, and rolled and rolled and rolled. Multiple directions, many times.

The wool around the circles seems felted but it is not penetrating through the silk. I think the silk is too thick a weave to allow the wool to get through. Also, I did not put any wool roving on the backside and that may have helped.

To try to save this piece, I gently rinsed some of the soap out. I am going to let it dry, then I am going to attack it with my felting machine. If I can get the wool fibers to embed in the silk, I may re-wet it and try to full it and get the wrinkly bubbly fabric I am hoping for.

I will try this again, but next time will use silk organza and wool roving on both sides. And maybe watch some more YouTube videos (I watched one when I knew it was not working right and would have at least done roving on both sides had I watched it before jumping in). If anyone has advice, please let me know.

Black and White Heart Assemblage

Taking up where I left off here, I finally glued down all the parts and pieces and stamped "you have my" on the left side. I may add some white accents, maybe dry brush some white on the textured frame.

More collages in progress

Since I had pulled out a lot of different papers from my stash to work on some collages last week, I thought I'd start some more so I would have less paper to put away.

My plan was to use more of the bleached photos as well, but I didn't end up including any of them.  All of these are just the first layer, I plan to add more to them later on.

I had experimented with two water soluble pencils on gessoed mat board recently. On this one, I used General's Scribe all pencil.  When squirted with water the writing ran a bit, but did not dissolve entirely.  I liked the affect. I put a wash of Golden's Nickel Azo Gold mixed with glazing medium on top. I plan to add a darker brown as I think it is too yellow orange.  Then I attached a piece of Citrasolv paper (National Geographic magazines coated with Citrasolv on each page in a well ventilated room or outside, let it rest for 10 to 20 minutes, then tear out the pages and let them dry. I would recommend googling some better directions if you are interested in doing this). I like that the dark image looks like a roof and I plan to draw in a house in the center.

On this one, the writing is with a General's Sketch and wash pencil. I did not like it as much, when sprayed with water, the text dissolved so much it almost disappeared, and it made the whole page gray. I attached some painted tissue paper at the top and bottom. This one needs a lot of work as it is a hot mess. I think if I did a green glaze over the text it would look a lot better.

These next two are just different papers collaged to watercolor paper.  From top left, clockwise: stamped colored cardstock, painted brown paper bag, scrap paper that protected my work surface for a long time, Citrasolv paper, painted Tyvek with some stamped tissue paper and painted textured wall paper on top.

From top left, clockwise: Citrasolv paper (turquoise) with scrap from the purple/blue bleached photo I used in a collage last week (this is the back side of the photo, the photo ink smeared on the back side when I was bleaching it), painted Tyvek, large painted piece is scrap wallpaper that protected my work surface, and at the bottom is textured painted wallpaper.

I think these are great starts!

Kitchen remodel

 It's been a crazy couple of weeks, as we have been getting our kitchen remodeled.

We had wood cabinets from the 40's or 50's (which had been painted numerous times). They are old enough that one of the drawers was metal for a flour drawer. The counter tops were 3" tiles with wood trim on the front, and a star motif back splash at the sink from some 80's renovation.

There was a opening above the oven, but it wasn't really functional (provided a view of the back hallway) so we had it filled in so we can have more cabinet space. Also there is no coat closet in the house so we are going to put a cabinet for coats on the reverse side of this wall.

After the wood-look laminate floor was gone, we have this lovely blue linoleum underneath. (Remind me to clean up all the papers on the frig, that looks horrible!). The contractor chipped up the linoleum. It had been glued down with tar, so the floor was a bit sticky for a while.

 It's been about three weeks now, and all the cabinets are in, and the new wood-look laminate floor is in.  I got under-cabinet lighting (woohoo!). We are still waiting for the quartz counter tops, which will be another week or so.

Today is the first real day I have had the house to myself in roughly three weeks. I am loving the peace and quiet and I am looking forward to a productive week.

I saved about five or six of the old door fronts as I thought they would make good substrates for paintings or collages. I filled the holes from the knobs with spackle but I am waiting for a warm day to sand them front and back. We got 8" of snow yesterday so now I have to wait for the snow to melt as well, as I want to sand where there is currently snow. I am jonesing to do some snow dyeing, but really want to get some cotton or rayon velvet for this. I just want mottled colors on the velvet, and snow dyeing will do that. I am not concerned with the fractured look that snow dyeing can sometimes provide as the pile on the velvet will hide that. I could do parfait dyeing or low-immersion dyeing instead, but the snow is calling my name.

Another great assemblage find at the thrift store

I went to one of my usual thrift stores yesterday, it's a small place with mainly clothes, but occasionally I find something out of the ordinary.  I found this brass tray that reminds me of a Moorish arch. The shop keeper thought it looked like a keyhole. Either way I was quite content to take it off their hands.  I am going to put it in a wood shadow box.

I want to fill the area behind it with metal bits, trims, etc. Here is a start, but I have a long way to go.

For the center, I want to create a felted landscape. I am using this little sketch from my journal as a reference.

I think I will paint the outer frame red to compliment to the colorful interior. I haven't decided what color to paint behind the metal bits, but like my sketch quite a bit so may keep close to it for colors.