Manipulating Fabric

Manipulating Fabric
Dye your fabrics and stretch your fabric stash to fit any project!
Manipulating fibers, fabrics, thread and yarn is like waving a magic wand. Abra cadabra! Your stash is quatrupeled
With a little paint , dye and perhaps alcohol ink or a stamp pad ink you can coordinate any fabric to be exactly what you need.
Now don't you wish you could do that with your honey?

Here is what you will need to start:
A variety of fabrics and fibers to manipulate
A spray fabric paint or diluted acrylic paint.
Rubber Gloves
A disposable work surface. I use plastic plates.
Spray bottle filled with water.
Paper Towels
Drying Surface (a layer of plastic is fine)
Iron to set colors (optional)

This project is for beginners or experienced fiber artists. I use a spray fabric paint called s.e.i. tumble dry. I picked it up at Hobby Lobby. I often use acrylic paints as well. If you use fabric dyes, be sure that they are compatible with the type of fiber you are coloring. Most any fabric or fiber can be manipulated. I often change the color of silk flower petals. The flower above was made from a number of yellow and white disassembled silk flowers. I added yellow to them all and a bit of pink here and there to create a pretty glow. The depth and tone of the final result may vary by fiber. I really love coloring yarns and embroidery cotton. I can create the perfect accent for my stitching projects. Its all good!
In this demonstration I am manipulating cotton batting in white and unbleached, mohair blend synthetic yarn, crochet cotton and silk flower petals

1. Lay your fibers out on a plastic plate. Don't worry about over loading it. Everything will get squished together eventually.

2. Spray everything with water. Soak some, and dampen others for different effects.

3. Spray your fabrics and fibers with the color of your choice. Don't worry about saturating each piece. Just give it a few squirts to start.

4. Spray again with water. This spreads the color and adds a mottled look to each piece of fabric.

5. Mash it all together so the color is covering most fibers. Gloves are essential, unless you also like your fingers and nails to be colorful!

6. Add more color to refresh the intensity or add a second color! Repeat the spraying, watering and squishing until you reach your desired colors. When adding new colors, try not to blend completely. Allow variations to happen. Be wary of allowing white to show around the edges. While they look great on your fabric piece, white can be distracting when you are actually cutting and sewing into your project.

7. Allow to dry. Colors will become lighter once dry.

Here are a number of colorways I created with this method.

I've included some of these fabrics in my new Needle Case Embroidery Journal Kit found in my Etsy shop.


Here are some fibers I dyed and the fabric flower I used them in. Beautiful and unique.
Its so worth it to add a part of you to the things you create.