Ice Dyeing

There are so many techniques for special dyeing effects. Here are the useful methods. We will see more about other method in my next blogpost.

Tie Dye
Shibori
Ombre
Dip Dye
Shaded
Hand Paint
Resist
Batik
ice dyeing
spray dyeing

Among these, I think ice dyeing is a very interesting one. I searched and found that there are so many posts, articles, and videos as well, but these all are done on cotton using cold brand reactive dyes.
That procedure is very easy, as the cotton or silk can be dyed without heating or steaming.
When we use acid dyes, it becomes a bit difficult process, as acid dyes require steaming to fix the dyes on fiber.
So let's start the process.
Soak the scarves for at least 15 minutes using acidic acid (or vinegar). Let the PH be around 5, adjusted with acidic acid. Use 3-4 tablespoonfuls of common salt.

Random fold before putting ice cube

Arrange some ice cubes. Squeeze the scarf and make it semi-dry. Let it be a bit moist. If the scarf is very dry, it creates a problem in the migration and penetration of dyes. Basically, water is the main medium of dyeing here, we are selecting ice as the medium. The amount of ice required is as per the depth of the shade. if we require dark shade, then we should use more ice. Put a semi-dry scarf into a small pot, making some rough folds. Please don't use excess ice, calculate the amount of ice that will be absorbed by scarf only. Excess ice could ruine the pattern. At the end of process there should not be any water, let the melted ice water be take by the scarf only.

folded scarf along with required amount of ice cube

First, put the ice covering each and every part of the scarves. Do not leave any part uncovering the scarf. Remember to make random folds and pleats; this folding technique makes scarfs beautiful after dyeing. Here you can apply tie-dye and shibori folding techniques also.

randomly applied dyes powder on ice cubes

Put the acid dyes powder randomly. If you want to have some particular color on any part of the scarf, spread only that color on that area. If colors are mixed together, some different colors will appear. for example, if you put red and blue in the same place, then violet or purple will be seen after dyeing. Here I have used red, blue, green, and yellow colors.

Result after 12 hours.

This process is automatic. When the ice starts melting, dyes also start spreading. No human effort is required. The powder dyestuffs work amazingly. I said it automatically because ice, along with color, goes inside the fiber. We can't let it stop and divert to some other part. I also did it for the first time; that's why I was also curious to see the color-mixing effect.

Result after 24 hour

I have left it for 24 hours. When I did, it took 24 hours to melt. I did it in winter. Maybe it melts fast in the summertime. But leaving at 24 is the best idea, even in summer. Dyes penetrate perfectly if we extend time. The next morning when I take it out from the pot, it looks as shown below.

pattern seen after taking out from plastic pot

I dried the scarf. And to fix the color, it has to be steamed. But I was shocked by the result that all the dyestuffs I put had been migrated to fiber. I tested first by using a finger and then a white paper in both cases. I did not notice color coming out of the scarf. If PH is adjusted properly, dyes go inside the fiber easily.

final result

Before steaming, it was like the above-shown pictures. In layman's language, it is raw (NOT COOKED) color. So it has to be cooked:)

Steaming

Doing Steaming is difficult at home. Printed or painted textile steaming, also known as ager done by ager machine, is used in textile processing factories. Here I am going to do it by a domestic method. The basic purpose of stemming is to send saturated steam to the fabric. The domestic pot, as explained below, would be sufficient for fixing the dyes in fiber. It has to be placed in a steaming vessel so that no condensed water falls on the fabric.

At this temperature dyes reacts with fibre making a chemical bond and become the part of the fibre and no body can extract it out of fiber by any means.

Since the applied dyes by this method are raw and need to boil in the process of dyeing. As we can't put them in dyebath, we need to expose them or go through the steaming process which ultimately provides the required temperature like in the process of dyeing.

After steaming, it was washed multiple times, initially in cold water followed by luck warm and finally soapy water and dried. The final picture is displayed there.

Here is the link to video

Please click to watch the video

Tie dye is an art; this ancient dyeing technique is still extensively practiced all over the world. By using this method, fabric or the textile material is dyed by hiding the portion that has to be left untouched by colors using rope, thread, rubber bands, yarn, and string. So, the fundamental principle of TIE DYE is to partly or entirely stop the applied dye from dyeing the fabric.

Let's start tying (tieing). Dyer has to try with different fold and tie to get new design and pattern. As this a hand art, if noted down the process accurately the duplication could be very close to the original. There are an infinite number of methods one can bind, stitch, twist, fold or compress the fabric to obtain different pattern and design. So the design, pattern i.e. output is also infinite quantity.

Selecting dyes

Cellulose fibers such as cotton, linen, hemp, and rayon are dyed using REACTIVE DYESProtein-based fibers such as wool, silk, wool, and feathers, as well as the man-made polyamide fiber, nylon, can be dyed using ACID DYES.Some of the well-known dyes manufacturers are DYSTAR, HUNTSMAN, CLARIANT and BASF. These companies produce almost all range of dyes and finishing chemical for all kind of textile material. As these are multinational corporations, they have their distributors in almost all the country of the world.

Tied for dyeing

Pot dyeing

The tied scarves are put in a pot have the pre-dissolve dyes with acetic acid. This pot is placed on a stove and is boiled. After boiling the dyes migrate to fiber. At this stage, if we look at the water it becomes colorless or with very less color.

Cellulose fiber

Cold dyeing method --Normally cellulose fiber is dyed by cold type reactive dyes ( PROCION MX ) which are usually applied between 25 to 40 degree Celsius. And we don’t have to boil the dye bath.

Hot dyeing method-- This is a less desired process because it has to be dyed by increasing the temperature even up to boiling point.

An experienced or skilled dyer is required, to do both methods, to get better and expected result

Protein-based fibre

Here acid dyes are used to dye the fabric. We must boil the bye bath to migrate the dyes to the fabric.

Here is a tutorial video of tie dye. Here I have used LANASET Red2B