I was reading the latest Quilting Arts magazine - Dec/Jan 2009 - and found an article about felting various fibres together to make a surface ... so I had a go. I can't tell you what the fibres I used were, as I just grabbed things from my stash. I used 2 different bases for the needle felting - a grey dense piece of foam, and the small 'brush' base that came with the Clover felting tool. While the grey foam has worked well for some things I've done, and it is much larger, the 'brush' was better for this piece. The fibres were placed between 2 layers of fine tulle. When finished, they stay felted to the base, but the top layer peels away. In the magazine, an embellisher machine was used, but I was pleased with the results I achieved with the hand tool. I'm intending to add some embellishment, and ... who knows??
Helen, in my textiles group, was cleaning out her stash, and giving things away. I was lucky enough to score a piece of collaged/ machine made/ 'fabric' - not really sure what to call it, but I love the colours and textures. I hope you don't mind, Helen, but it is now in 3 pieces - 2 of them on a book covers, and 1 waiting on my sewing table to be put on another one. The red cover is actually on my new 2009 diary, so I'll probably get to enjoy that piece every day for 12 months.
Beverley
A small group of friends, making things together
Saturday, 24 January 2009
Wednesday, 7 January 2009
fabric dyeing experiment
Some of you know that I've been thinking of trying some fabric dyeing - let me tell you about last week's experiment ...
1. Buy 2 new shirts on the pre-Christmas sales. 1 x white, because white goes with everything, and 1 x deep green, because a bit of colour is a good thing.
2. Take them on holidays.
3. THIS IS THE IMPORTANT PART - find a washing machine without any words on it, in any language, and try to decipher the symbols on the panel. What on earth do a leaf, a cloud, and what looks like an upside-down plumber's plunger, have to do with washing cycles? Find the on/off button.
4. After a very long time, take the washing out and realise that you've run a very hot wash (something you'd never do at home - always cold water) and seem to have dyed and heat-set the white shirt, a delicate shade of blue/green.
5. Complete the heat-setting process by drying the wash in the tropical/sauna-like breeze on the balcony.
6. Ignore your husband's comments about the colour of his new underwear - it's a holiday, so he's lucky you washed for him.
7. Wear your newly dyed shirt with your blue 3/4 length pants - nice match.
Why do we spend so much time worrying about setting dyes, when they seem able to do it for themselves???
1. Buy 2 new shirts on the pre-Christmas sales. 1 x white, because white goes with everything, and 1 x deep green, because a bit of colour is a good thing.
2. Take them on holidays.
3. THIS IS THE IMPORTANT PART - find a washing machine without any words on it, in any language, and try to decipher the symbols on the panel. What on earth do a leaf, a cloud, and what looks like an upside-down plumber's plunger, have to do with washing cycles? Find the on/off button.
4. After a very long time, take the washing out and realise that you've run a very hot wash (something you'd never do at home - always cold water) and seem to have dyed and heat-set the white shirt, a delicate shade of blue/green.
5. Complete the heat-setting process by drying the wash in the tropical/sauna-like breeze on the balcony.
6. Ignore your husband's comments about the colour of his new underwear - it's a holiday, so he's lucky you washed for him.
7. Wear your newly dyed shirt with your blue 3/4 length pants - nice match.
Why do we spend so much time worrying about setting dyes, when they seem able to do it for themselves???
Wednesday, 24 December 2008
Printing 2 from Prue
Here are photos of Prue's samples from the printing playday back in November.
This one is two prints from a texture plate.
And here, more printing on paper.
In this one, a piece of grid was used to print.
This one used a mixture of techniques (it's half the piece).
And here is the other half.
This one was her monoprint, from the paint on the tile.
This one was her rolling pin print. I love the texture this method gives the fabric.
This one is two prints from a texture plate.And here, more printing on paper. In this one, a piece of grid was used to print.This one used a mixture of techniques (it's half the piece). And here is the other half.This one was her monoprint, from the paint on the tile.
Aren't they interesting? Printing on fabric gives it such interesting texture, as you can see on Beverley's piece. It's such a great starting place.
Merry Christmas
It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas ....
we have 3 house guests for Christmas - and in keeping with the real meaning of Christmas, they've been told that there is no room in the house, and they have to sleep in the garage.
They were very interested the other day when I was doing some textile painting on the deck. I had a piece of green fabric, commercially printed - but I wanted to go one better. I added gold paint, by putting it on a texture plate then putting the fabric on top, and pressing firmly on the back of the fabric. I didn't bother to line things up very carefully.
I machine quilted the fabric, with thin batting and lining, in a rather random pattern. Some of it follows the patterns in the fabric - some of it just wanders.
I also couched down some fancy thread for added texture.
When I showed the finished result off at Fibrecircle, some people were horrified that I wanted to cut it up. But as I sat here last night, and saw the late night news come on ... well let's just say, I was much happier with my sewing machine, than I would have been Christmas shopping until midnight, and I think my aunt will like her matching glasses case and notebook with cover.
have a great Christmas
Beverley
we have 3 house guests for Christmas - and in keeping with the real meaning of Christmas, they've been told that there is no room in the house, and they have to sleep in the garage.
They were very interested the other day when I was doing some textile painting on the deck. I had a piece of green fabric, commercially printed - but I wanted to go one better. I added gold paint, by putting it on a texture plate then putting the fabric on top, and pressing firmly on the back of the fabric. I didn't bother to line things up very carefully.
I machine quilted the fabric, with thin batting and lining, in a rather random pattern. Some of it follows the patterns in the fabric - some of it just wanders.
I also couched down some fancy thread for added texture.
When I showed the finished result off at Fibrecircle, some people were horrified that I wanted to cut it up. But as I sat here last night, and saw the late night news come on ... well let's just say, I was much happier with my sewing machine, than I would have been Christmas shopping until midnight, and I think my aunt will like her matching glasses case and notebook with cover.
have a great Christmas
Beverley
Monday, 8 December 2008
More melting stuff
Today we had another playday with our heat guns and soldering irons. Each person focused on different things.
Nola was interested in making stamps by melting, and in melting media onto another surface. The first attempt was to melt polystyrene meat trays with the soldering iron. These meat trays are more dense than polystyrene boxes, so they looked a promising media for stamp-makingby melting. First, the rim of the tray was cut off and the base was cut into two sections about 3 1/2in x 2 1/2in. One was drawn on with a sharp biro, to give a fine line drawing when printed. The second was drawn on with the soldering iron and most of the background was melted away, leaving some textural marks like woodcuts or linocuts.
They're hard to photograph since the meat tray was black, but the results were very interesting. I'll show the resulting prints when I have some. I was surprised that melting the meat trays didn't cause more of a chemical smell, but I'd still recommend the use of a mask when melting any media.
I've also been given part of a yoga mat, since we'd been told that the material these are made from behaves like Memory Foam - when heated, it will take an imprint which remains until the foam is reheated. This is certainly true of this yoga mat. I cut a small rectangle, heated it with the heat gun and pressed it onto a Fiskars Texture Plate. The result was an interesting stamp.
Why bother if I have the plate? The Fiskars Texture Plates are designed for embossing paper, so the pattern is below the surface of the plate (intaglio). If you take a print from the plate, the background of the pattern takes the ink or paint, and the pattern remains unpainted. Sometimes, you want the reverse of this - the pattern, in relief, to take the paint and the background to be unpainted. This process allows you to take a positive imprint of any negative pattern and print from it. When you apply heat to the yoga mat, the pattern disappears and you can take a different imprint.
I was interested to see whether the yoga mat would melt under the soldering iron and whether this would still make a removable imprint. I drew a design on another small piece of the yoga mat with my soldering iron.
The yoga mat meltd more reluctantly than the meat trays but it did produce a rough outline. However, this outline is permanent, i.e. doesn't disappear when the medium is reheated. The meat trays seem like a better medium for this purpose.
I also tried using FunFoam, a very cheap craft foam, readily available from Two Dollar shops and other thrift stores. It did not take an imprint from the texture plates very well, and it did not melt well with the soldering iron, though it was possible to make a stamp of sorts.
When reheated, the marks were found to be permanent, but the foam, being thin, tended to curl on itself.
Finally, I wanted to try melting media onto a base. I tested some felt, and found it was wool-based, so it wouldn't melt when hot things were added. Using the heat gun, I gently melted some children's wax crayons so they dripped and drizzled onto the felt surface. I also used the soft wax to hold down a tiny piece of organza that I melted onto the felt. The wax crayon dried stiff, so it might be too heavy for fabric, but it was fine on wool felt. The result was interesting but was improved by the addition of some embossing powder. The powder does tend to fly about under the heat gun, unless the base media is held up to prevent it. It's an interesting way to get a fine sprinkling of sparkle all over a piece, with some areas much stronger.
I think this process offers some interesting possibilities. The melted crayon could be stamped into while still wet, and it could also be used to hold down other media.
Nola was interested in making stamps by melting, and in melting media onto another surface. The first attempt was to melt polystyrene meat trays with the soldering iron. These meat trays are more dense than polystyrene boxes, so they looked a promising media for stamp-makingby melting. First, the rim of the tray was cut off and the base was cut into two sections about 3 1/2in x 2 1/2in. One was drawn on with a sharp biro, to give a fine line drawing when printed. The second was drawn on with the soldering iron and most of the background was melted away, leaving some textural marks like woodcuts or linocuts.
They're hard to photograph since the meat tray was black, but the results were very interesting. I'll show the resulting prints when I have some. I was surprised that melting the meat trays didn't cause more of a chemical smell, but I'd still recommend the use of a mask when melting any media.I've also been given part of a yoga mat, since we'd been told that the material these are made from behaves like Memory Foam - when heated, it will take an imprint which remains until the foam is reheated. This is certainly true of this yoga mat. I cut a small rectangle, heated it with the heat gun and pressed it onto a Fiskars Texture Plate. The result was an interesting stamp.
Why bother if I have the plate? The Fiskars Texture Plates are designed for embossing paper, so the pattern is below the surface of the plate (intaglio). If you take a print from the plate, the background of the pattern takes the ink or paint, and the pattern remains unpainted. Sometimes, you want the reverse of this - the pattern, in relief, to take the paint and the background to be unpainted. This process allows you to take a positive imprint of any negative pattern and print from it. When you apply heat to the yoga mat, the pattern disappears and you can take a different imprint.I was interested to see whether the yoga mat would melt under the soldering iron and whether this would still make a removable imprint. I drew a design on another small piece of the yoga mat with my soldering iron.
The yoga mat meltd more reluctantly than the meat trays but it did produce a rough outline. However, this outline is permanent, i.e. doesn't disappear when the medium is reheated. The meat trays seem like a better medium for this purpose.I also tried using FunFoam, a very cheap craft foam, readily available from Two Dollar shops and other thrift stores. It did not take an imprint from the texture plates very well, and it did not melt well with the soldering iron, though it was possible to make a stamp of sorts.
When reheated, the marks were found to be permanent, but the foam, being thin, tended to curl on itself.Finally, I wanted to try melting media onto a base. I tested some felt, and found it was wool-based, so it wouldn't melt when hot things were added. Using the heat gun, I gently melted some children's wax crayons so they dripped and drizzled onto the felt surface. I also used the soft wax to hold down a tiny piece of organza that I melted onto the felt. The wax crayon dried stiff, so it might be too heavy for fabric, but it was fine on wool felt. The result was interesting but was improved by the addition of some embossing powder. The powder does tend to fly about under the heat gun, unless the base media is held up to prevent it. It's an interesting way to get a fine sprinkling of sparkle all over a piece, with some areas much stronger.
I think this process offers some interesting possibilities. The melted crayon could be stamped into while still wet, and it could also be used to hold down other media.
Thursday, 13 November 2008
Wednesday, 12 November 2008
Printing 2
Since I missed the printing day this week, today I thought I'd experiment with the things I'd packed to take along.
First, I played with the rolling pin, as seen on the Threads site. First I tried wrapping the rolling pin in rubber bands.
I spread some textile printing ink on my glass cutting board, rolled the rolling pin in it and printed onto cream quilter's muslin. I repeated this four times, turning the fabric around each time so I began at alternating ends. This is what my print looks like: 
Much like I expected. It gives an interesting pattern, but the drawback, not mentioned on the Threads site, is that you only get a clear print for one revolution of the rolling pin (or brayer). If you wanted to print a ripple pattern like this over a length of yardage, such as for dressmaking, you would need to use the normal methods for registration of repeat patterns - a regular mark on the fabric and a corresponding alignment mark on the roller - so the pattern was continuous, or at least contiguous.
I also found a stretchy headband at the local Vinnies shop that I thought might be interesting wrapped around the rolling pin.
The headband was stretched evenly around the rolling pin and held on by rubber bands. I rolled the inked rolling pin diagonally twice across my fabric.
As I'd hoped, it gave a very interesting textural print.
By now the glass plate was drying out but I had some interesting patterns in the remaining ink. I took a monoprint directly from the glass, by laying the fabric over it and rolling it with the brayer.
Very moody! I took a second print, which was much paler.
Then I moved on to the straw placemats I bought at Vinnies. 
I wanted to see if the print was any different between laying the fabric over the place mat and rolling the paint on with the brayer or laying fabric paint on the placemat and rolling on the fabric with a dry brayer. Rolling the paint on with the brayer gave me this:
Rolling the paint onto the straw placemat and rolling with the dry brayer from the wrong side of the fabric gave me this:
The difference seems to be that it's easy to overload the brayer with paint with the first method, even when you're trying not to. The pattern is still visible but it's much clearer and more delicate when you take a print from the straw itself.
I had some paint left on the glass plate, so I took a monoprint.
I really like monoprints (even though this one looks like a brown splodge!) because you never quite know what you're going to get.
I also had some Fiskars Texture Plates to play with (thanks, Carol!).
I printed from these by spreading several colours of gouache onto the plate and rolling the fabric on the back with the brayer.
This one had a little too much paint on the plate! The second print from the same paint was better:
It's hard to see how these would be different from inking the plate and using it as a stamp, though! Maybe you have a little more control of the process with the fabric on top.I took a third print, by rubbing the fabric with my fingers from the back rather than using the brayer, so it pressed down a little into the ripples of the plate.
This gave it a softer, more blurred print, with the last of the paint on the plate, which I quite like too. This is possible to do even if you had previously been stamping with the plate.
I can see the plates are going to be fun to play with. I'm not sure I'll bother with rolling pin prints much, though I do like the patterns I made.
First, I played with the rolling pin, as seen on the Threads site. First I tried wrapping the rolling pin in rubber bands.
I spread some textile printing ink on my glass cutting board, rolled the rolling pin in it and printed onto cream quilter's muslin. I repeated this four times, turning the fabric around each time so I began at alternating ends. This is what my print looks like: Much like I expected. It gives an interesting pattern, but the drawback, not mentioned on the Threads site, is that you only get a clear print for one revolution of the rolling pin (or brayer). If you wanted to print a ripple pattern like this over a length of yardage, such as for dressmaking, you would need to use the normal methods for registration of repeat patterns - a regular mark on the fabric and a corresponding alignment mark on the roller - so the pattern was continuous, or at least contiguous.I also found a stretchy headband at the local Vinnies shop that I thought might be interesting wrapped around the rolling pin.
The headband was stretched evenly around the rolling pin and held on by rubber bands. I rolled the inked rolling pin diagonally twice across my fabric.
As I'd hoped, it gave a very interesting textural print.By now the glass plate was drying out but I had some interesting patterns in the remaining ink. I took a monoprint directly from the glass, by laying the fabric over it and rolling it with the brayer.
Very moody! I took a second print, which was much paler.
Then I moved on to the straw placemats I bought at Vinnies. 
I wanted to see if the print was any different between laying the fabric over the place mat and rolling the paint on with the brayer or laying fabric paint on the placemat and rolling on the fabric with a dry brayer. Rolling the paint on with the brayer gave me this:
Rolling the paint onto the straw placemat and rolling with the dry brayer from the wrong side of the fabric gave me this:
The difference seems to be that it's easy to overload the brayer with paint with the first method, even when you're trying not to. The pattern is still visible but it's much clearer and more delicate when you take a print from the straw itself.I had some paint left on the glass plate, so I took a monoprint.
I really like monoprints (even though this one looks like a brown splodge!) because you never quite know what you're going to get.I also had some Fiskars Texture Plates to play with (thanks, Carol!).
I printed from these by spreading several colours of gouache onto the plate and rolling the fabric on the back with the brayer.
This one had a little too much paint on the plate! The second print from the same paint was better:
It's hard to see how these would be different from inking the plate and using it as a stamp, though! Maybe you have a little more control of the process with the fabric on top.I took a third print, by rubbing the fabric with my fingers from the back rather than using the brayer, so it pressed down a little into the ripples of the plate.
This gave it a softer, more blurred print, with the last of the paint on the plate, which I quite like too. This is possible to do even if you had previously been stamping with the plate.I can see the plates are going to be fun to play with. I'm not sure I'll bother with rolling pin prints much, though I do like the patterns I made.