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Tuesday, February 28, 2012

Alternative wedding dresses


I got a really exciting message on etsy this morning. My white nuno felted dress with doilies has been featured on a blog for alternative wedding dresses. If you are planning to marry, have a look there, as you might find a wonderful one of a kind dress:Link
http://weddingzilla.blogspot.com.au/2012/02/alternative-wedding-dresses.html

Monday, February 27, 2012

Felting a small handbag workshop


I will teaching a feltmaking workshop on the 17th of March in my studio in Mareeba (Far North Queensland). The details are on my site: http://lizetfrijters.com/workshops.html

Friday, February 24, 2012

Why choose natural materials versus synthetic

Another interesting article on the eco textiles blog. It turns out that a lot of the plastics find in oceans actually come from synthetic fibers. It is not because we don't see it that it isn't there. This is another reason why to choose natural materials for clothing and home.

http://oecotextiles.wordpress.com/2012/02/18/synthetic-fibers-and-our-oceans/

Tuesday, February 21, 2012

Fermentation dyeing results

I have been doing some fermentation dyeing, using the technique of Anne Rieger. I love her technique and the results are worth the time waiting for the fermentation to happen.

In the image above, the left side shows the results of mango leaves and right of yellow onion skins. The top was only in an acid bath and going more to the bottom each time a bit longer in the alkaline bath. I get a completely different result with the mango leaves than when I use immersion dyeing. Maybe, I haven't let them ferment long enough. I need to do some more experiments with them. Although, I love the browns that I got.

Why I love this technique so much:
- I find it the most environmentally friendly and purest way of natural dyeing that I have come accross sofar.
- There are absolutely no mordants used
- No need for an external energy source other than the warmth of the sun to warm up the baths. - There is also very little water needed
- the colour holds well and nearly no dye runs when rinsing.
- The dye plants can dye for a long time as the fermentation keeps going
- I like to help in keeping a very old tradition alive

Why I don't always use this:
- sometimes materials need to be dyed fast and I can't wait for months to have them. That is when I go back to immersion dyeing
- I sometimes still use dye stuffs coming from other places, in extracts or powders. I find that the fermentation works best with whole plants and the most sustainable is to use local plants, fresh from the garden.
- It is very time consuming as the dye baths need to be checked every day for pH for best results.
- I also like the results obtained with eco prints, even there are some metal mordants used, but only metal oxides and this provides different possibilities.

So, I keep going with several methods, depending on my needs.
I will show more results from my dyeing experiments soon.

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