Results and More Results

Last Saturday (May 9), I showed you a small test I was conducting. I brushed some of the Dr. Ph. Martin's Bombay India Inks onto a piece of fabric. My results are below. I cut the fabric swatch into three pieces. I kept one piece as my control, it is unwashed and un-heat set, just air dried from brushing on the ink. The middle section I ironed to heat set. The bottom piece I didn't heat set. I tossed the two pieces into a warm water bath with a drop of Synthrapol, stirred them around a bit and then let them soak for an hour or more.

They came out really well in my opinion. I think they lost just a minimal amount of color, so minimal it's almost hard to tell. I didn't see any color in the wash water. It looks to me like the heat setting wasn't necessary to maintain the color in the fabric. So now I know that I can use these inks on fabric and if it gets wet, they won't bleed and wash out. The ink does change the hand of the fabric a little bit, but nothing very significant, in my opinion.


Here are some fabrics that I hand dyed. Yum!


And here is the quilt I've been working on for a couple weeks now (I showed you a sneak peek a couple of days ago). I used many techniques from Melanie Testa's book Inspired to Quilt. I like how this turned out. At first I thought I'd add more quilting on the cat, but the way it is now, the silk organza puffs up a bit and gives it a dimensional quality that makes the cat seem almost 3D.


Today I am washing my deconstructed screen printed fabrics. They are drying as I write this post. I'll share those with you tomorrow. Hey, it's Friday!!!