Dyeing clothes in your washing machine
This Sunday, after helping Mimi with her laundry (the washing machine in her household has broken down, and her room-mate ain't obviously thinking about getting it fixed anytime soon...), I finally got together all the clothes I've been meaning to dye for a while now.
Dyeing using a washing machine is quite easy - the first time I tried was back in 2004 when I had this gray jacket with a trench-coat cut I liked but made me look like a mouse. I dyed it a warm brown instead, and was very happy with the results. Since then, I've been dyeing things and clothes at least once a year. Last year, I dyed Mimi's white IKEA-bedspread a sunny yellow, but we forgot to wash the spread beforehand, so the resulting color was splotchy. Sometime now, I'll get her to re-dye it. (Otherwise I'll remember that failure forever!)
This time, however, was the first time I wanted to try and use mixed colors. So I bought a violet and a red dye packet, and the results were clothes colored in cold violet and warm violet. How much a color gets stuck is really just dependent on the type of fabric you're dyeing. In this lot, I had cotton, cotton/acrylics, linen and silk.The silk took to the dye the most, and I think the linen got the most beautiful color.
So, the colors the clothes had before were:
Dyeing using a washing machine is quite easy - the first time I tried was back in 2004 when I had this gray jacket with a trench-coat cut I liked but made me look like a mouse. I dyed it a warm brown instead, and was very happy with the results. Since then, I've been dyeing things and clothes at least once a year. Last year, I dyed Mimi's white IKEA-bedspread a sunny yellow, but we forgot to wash the spread beforehand, so the resulting color was splotchy. Sometime now, I'll get her to re-dye it. (Otherwise I'll remember that failure forever!)
This time, however, was the first time I wanted to try and use mixed colors. So I bought a violet and a red dye packet, and the results were clothes colored in cold violet and warm violet. How much a color gets stuck is really just dependent on the type of fabric you're dyeing. In this lot, I had cotton, cotton/acrylics, linen and silk.The silk took to the dye the most, and I think the linen got the most beautiful color.
This is how the lot looked as it got out of the dye-wash.
I had to wash them one time "normally", to get rid of the dye that hadn't stuck.
This is how they looked while drying: the color kept quite well.
So, the colors the clothes had before were:
- A white T-shirt and one in light green
- 3 of Mom's dark pink T-shirts
- A light green silk scarf I'd gotten from my aunt*
- Our family's old white linen Christmas table cloth
- A crazy yellow top
- A top in light yellow, and light pink
* I liked the scarf before, but the color is just impossible to use with my new hair-color!
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