This is the front of the piece, I added painted wonder under and angelina to the surface. I'll do some more embellishing and embroidery later this week.

More silk throwsters paper! This is the back side.

Felted Throwsters Waste

Well sorta, or you could even call it silk paper. You take silk throwsters waste and pull it into thin sheets spritz with water and place between two sheets of parchment paper. Press with a hot iron until the water stops sizzling. This creates a nice sheet of silk paper/fabric. The sericin glues itself together.

I then needle felted the silk fibers onto a piece of silk organza net with wool and angelina so that it would look like the aurora borealis. This is the back side of the piece.

Samples

Take copper add puff paint, lumierie paints, felt, and thread subject to a heat gun and you get this!

Sometimes

When your back is up against a wall the only thing that is left to do is create art!

Guest Artist Regina Rooks

Regina Rooks will be my guest artist this year! Her watercolors and jewelry are mouth wateringly beautiful! So if your in Ames Iowa this weekend come on by and meet Regina - she'll be demoing some of her painting techniques on fabrics.

Holiday Open House

What I've Been Up To

I've been dyeing fibers like a mad woman to be exact, and the pile isn't going to get smaller anytime soon! I'm not sure why the one image, of the silk noils, is so blurry. All of the fibers are available in my store.

Big Foot

Pepper to the left, Thomas to the right. Pepper is glaring at me, and the camera because I woke them up from a nap. They sleep together all of the time it's pretty darn cute! Ignore the messy bedding, it's what they like best!

And here he the sleepy head with his tongue sticking out! I woke him up, he's not nearly as grumpy as Pepper when I take his picture.

I just had to show everyone how big Thomas' feet are! He's finally growing into his feet and will most probably be quite the little chunker!

Studio Clean Up

We spent the day cleaning and rearranging the classroom and studio today. I ended up putting the counter top, for the cash registar, at an angle which really opened up the space making it more accessible. I'll take photos tomorrow.

Rusted Constructed Cloth

Finished piece of rust dyed silk carrier rod rusted cloth, approx 8 x 10 inches. I sewed it freehand on the machine, backed them with aquabond - doesn't leave a film on the silk rods.

Detail

Check out my August 2007 for images of rust dyed ribbons and the like

Rusted Carrier Rods In Progress

The rods don't look like much here, I ended up letting them dry completely and then resoaked them with vinegar and put more gears on top of them. It was rather windy and I think the wind got up under the black plastic - which helps them rust faster btw - and dried them somewhat. They were still damp, but not enough to rust suffeciently.

I think the images of the rusted rods I turned into constructed cloth must be on the other computer as I"m not finding them here. They are on the blog somewhere back in July I do believe.

More Rusted Rods

Blogger is painfully slow tonight, everyone must be updating their blogs or something!

Rust Dyed Silk Carrier Rods

Here are some on an extreme embroidery piece I've been working on, I also have some that I made into constructed cloth. I have rust dyed carrier rods available for purchase on my Etsy.com store.

Rust Dyeing Notes

Rust dyeing is a surface design method that adds dimension to your fabrics and fibers. I use the technique predominately on cotton or silk fabrics. Natural fibers take the rust colors better than synthetic fibers.


You can rust dye onto commercially dyed and/or printed fabrics. However, fabrics dyed using synthetic dyes, or those dyed with natural dyes take rust dyeing best as they usually do not have anti-stain coatings on them. When applying rusty objects to naturally dyed fabrics the colors will change. Iron, i.e. rust, is a modifier and is used as a mordant with natural dyes. Modifiers change the existing color via shifts in the pH levels. An example would be hibiscus or cochineal, each yield a red color, when you add iron they shift from red to purple. A minute amount causes this color change.


You can place rusty objects next to wet fabric and acquire rust patterning over time. However, vinegar will speed up the rusting process, it aids in breaking the rust particles free from the object that is rusting. Rusting occurs normally due to oxidation, i.e. contact with the air. Be patient. Rust dyeing with water takes about a week. Using vinegar produces color in less time usually twenty-four hours.


I use straight vinegar and all sorts of rusty objects to acquire my rust dyed patterns. Old nails and wire work well for this technique. Wire can be used for bound resist techniques, especially when wrapping the fabric around a rusty pipe. Or you can simply lay the wire in a loose pattern on the fabric and rust it in that manner.


Pole wrapping and bound resist techniques work well with rust dyeing. Simply wrap your vinegar-saturated fabric around a rusty pole, being careful not to tear the fabric, scrunch and otherwise manipulate the fabric to created patterning.


You can sprinkle iron mordant or iron shavings onto your fabric for other patterning. Iron mordant is preferable to shavings. Shavings are often sharp things that can cut you or the fabric. Metal shavings may be coated in machinery oil which would put unwanted stains onto the fabric.


If you like your rusty pieces and want to push the rust dyeing technique further, rinse the fabric and neutralize it in salt water, rinse it again and then rust the fabric once more. This will help prevent the fabric from rotting through.


Natural rust is an iron oxide. It comes in about ten or more natural colors depending on what it is in the neighboring the iron ore. Wear gloves and a mask when working with it. Iron in this form wants to bind with your hemoglobin blocking all available sites for oxygen, ask me how I know. You can become gravely ill from too much contact with raw iron products. In addition, tolerance to raw iron varies with each person.


You can mix a small amount natural rust with water, I generally use one teaspoon rust to one cup liquid, or with soy milk to paint fabric. Stir well. Let it sit for 24 hours to ensure that all of the color will dissolve. Then apply the rust solution to the fabric. Use a old brush you can dedicate to this kind of project. Natural bristle brushes work best with this technique allowing the liquid to wick up the bristles and not leave a mess on your fabric. Cure the fabric dry for 24 hours. Rinse and neutralize your fabric in a saltwater solution.


When using the rust technique if you want the process to stop you need to neutralize it with a salt-water solution. Dissolve about 1/4 cup salt into four gallons of hot water. I do this in a five-gallon bucket. Soak your fabric in the salt water about fifteen minutes. Wash the fabric using a non-phosphorous soap or a mild color free shampoo.


To purchase "The Rust and Clay Dyeing Book" http://www.kbaxterpackwood.etsy.com/

Fall Etc.

Well I believe I may have mowed the lawn for the final time this year. The oak tree has completely lost it's leaves, which is really odd for our red oak as it's habit has been to lose it's leaves in the spring. The weather has been strange this year so I'm chocking it up to that.
The Jerusalem Artichokes are cut down, need to pull some so there will be room for them to produce large tubers next year.

I still need to deal with the blackberries, they have invaded everything! I'm thinking of digging in the ground and pulling the roots for a natural dye bath. I have about six fleeces left to cold soak and then put through a final wash in the washer, and a couple of alpaca and llama fleeces to skirt and I'm done with that for the season as well.

The house needs a final cleaning and the windows need to be dealt with otherwise I think I'm excited that winter will be here and really soon!

Art Starts

I'm working on this sign for the store, it's called Art Starts. It is muslin fabrics that have been ironed to a pelmet (I think it is) that has the fusible on both sides. Now I plan to stitch it, add stitched rat tail to the edges of each card, add brads to the corners and wire each panel together.

Art Starts, which Loretta thought up for me as she did NOT like the name Make it And Take it, is for our lunch our customers that want to try out the many techniques we use in the studio. Problem is most folks are tight on time, lunch hour, and cash. So we have devised a method for partially producing what will be a finished piece for them, like ATC's and Fabric Postcards, and they can have a blast in 30 minutes or less.

So me, being a fiber artist and all, decided to NOT produce "another" paper and laminate sign, via my computer, and decided that it was time to make the signs out of fibers instead. I stenciled the letters on with shiva paintstiks and a stencil brush. I"m quite proud of myself this is my first time stencilling on fabric and I was able to get crisp letters! Yay. I must say that this is way easier than stencilling on a wall!!!

Dyed Fleece

Here's another shot of my dyed lincoln fleeces, in front is silk noil lap, dyed lincoln behind, and again dyed silk lap behind (purple).

Fiber Batts

I've been making fiber batts to use in the studio, and for the open house that is coming up - weekend of November 17th. Here's a sampling of what I've been doing.

Left to Right Ingeo Fibers, Silk Noil, Lincoln (grey overdyed with red acid dyes) and Domestic wool blended with ingeo and angelina fibers.

Wine Bags

I'm teaching a wine bag class on Wed night, next week. What I'll be teaching is a constructed cloth method as this lends more beauty to what could be a rather ordinary bag. Here is also

a detail shot with the flash on. I made this with a coppery polyester sheer fabric as the lining, and a bunch of glizt yarns as the topping.

Check It Out

Was checking out shops on Etsy.com tonight and found this mans work, Danny Manmith
http://scrap-dannymansmith.squarespace.com/ seeing his work makes me not only want to get back into my studio to work, but to use up all of my scrap fabrics I have on hand!

Posts and Links

I'm not sure why the links are not showing up as hot links - did that one for Regina's blog here's the addy http://rgrdesigns.blogspot.com/ Will have to work on this!

Wool Batts

And not the kind that fly in the night! I made a wool batt tonight at the shop, haven't done this for about six years now. I was chatting with my friend Regina while making said batt. I blended a bunch of hand dyed fibers, ingeo (sp?) wool roving and angelina into one ounce of beautiful cherry red fibers. I'm inspired enough to fire up the spinning wheel tomorrow!