Tie Dying!

These look so cute and fun to make! I've made tie-die once before and I love it cause even if you make a mistake, it still looks amazing.

awesomeelle2001 said:

These look so cute and fun to make! I've made tie-die once before and I love it cause even if you make a mistake, it still looks amazing.

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Exactly! I do still get super mad when I splash a color in the wrong area but then after rinsing and washing I never even notice it? I'm just a huge perfectionist when it comes to art so I like die inside when it happens. XD

I've never done it but I always wanted to try, esp in the 90s haha.

RIP just bought 80 something shirts, once my check goes through I'll pick up the dye I need and start going at it!

Awesome shirts! That blue/purple one looks SPOT ON like one I have!

Yours look awesome!
i tried it once at a school camp but it turned out terrible and the colours looked gross ):

Yours look amazing they really turned out great! I love the look of tie dye and the act of doing it can also be really fun!

They look pretty great!

I once had to do this for Art Class, although mine turned out somewhat terrible.

Pretty sad, the dye we got was pretty much trash for tie dying! I don't know if it was just not pigmented enough or if it was because it was dye meant to soak and dye a solid piece of clothing, but we had to toss it all. I tried it on two shirts but could see as soon as I laid some dye on the shirt that it wasn't even really sucking into the fabric. So I ordered some professional tie dying dye! It should be here in a few days and next week we're going to go at it!

Also even though the dye was crap I could really tell how well some of my designs were going to turn out just by unfolding them so I am really excited to see them when they're actually done!

Wow your designs look great!! I really like the second set and your choice of colors I'm sorry the dye you got wasn't very good, but hopefully your new dye will make cool finished products like the ones you've made so far!!

I haven't done this in a few years actually, it really makes me want to do it with my gf. Time to start looking for decent dye!

Yes! I've been tie dyeing for years and used to sell designs at local street shows, as well as take custom commissions. I don't use a kit; I buy all my dyes separately along with chemical fixatives and urea, plus bottles and brushes. Here are a couple examples of my work:



It's funny to see this thread because I was actually talking to a friend just today about tie dyeing and how I wanted to make a few batches of shirts this summer. Time to ruin some towels.

I find tie dying to be really fun to do (not really the washing part of it though). I learned how to do it last year in chemistry and so far I have three shirts I've tie dyed myself. I'll prob post some pics later ^^"

hillaruhsaur said:

Wow your designs look great!! I really like the second set and your choice of colors I'm sorry the dye you got wasn't very good, but hopefully your new dye will make cool finished products like the ones you've made so far!!

I haven't done this in a few years actually, it really makes me want to do it with my gf. Time to start looking for decent dye!

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Oblivia said:

Yes! I've been tie dyeing for years and used to sell designs at local street shows, as well as take custom commissions. I don't use a kit; I buy all my dyes separately along with chemical fixatives and urea, plus bottles and brushes. Here are a couple examples of my work:

It's funny to see this thread because I was actually talking to a friend just today about tie dyeing and how I wanted to make a few batches of shirts this summer. Time to ruin some towels.

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Yeah the kits seem to fade too much so I actually just got the professional dyes from Dharma, I got the Soda Ash and Urea as well. I also got some racks and tubs to dye over and to organize my stuff when it's not in use, and a bunch of different sized bottles.

Oblivia your spirals look amazing! I love how differently they can come out depending on how you apply the die. =D

Oblivia said:

Yes! I've been tie dyeing for years and used to sell designs at local street shows, as well as take custom commissions. I don't use a kit; I buy all my dyes separately along with chemical fixatives and urea, plus bottles and brushes. Here are a couple examples of my work:

It's funny to see this thread because I was actually talking to a friend just today about tie dyeing and how I wanted to make a few batches of shirts this summer. Time to ruin some towels.

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Give me all of those :0

Seriously those look real amazing, cool to see so many here are into it =D

Only con with apartments where you need to book washing times; I don't think our whole building/complex would be glad if I did

KaydeeKrunk said:

Yeah the kits seem to fade too much so I actually just got the professional dyes from Dharma, I got the Soda Ash and Urea as well. I also got some racks and tubs to dye over and to organize my stuff when it's not in use, and a bunch of different sized bottles.

Oblivia your spirals look amazing! I love how differently they can come out depending on how you apply the die. =D

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Thank you! And yeah, I buy all my supplies from Dharma Trading Co. as well. I haven't found any dyes that compare to theirs, even if it's a bit more work to do all the mixing beforehand.

Sheila said:

Give me all of those :0

Seriously those look real amazing, cool to see so many here are into it =D

Only con with apartments where you need to book washing times; I don't think our whole building/complex would be glad if I did

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I'm so glad you like them, thank you! I think I kept a couple of those pictured, actually. Sometimes I dig the pattern so much that I can't bear to sell them. -_-

Oblivia said:

I'm so glad you like them, thank you! I think I kept a couple of those pictured, actually. Sometimes I dig the pattern so much that I can't bear to sell them. -_-

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No problems, they look so good! And that's understandable, I'd probably keep them all if I made them to be honest.

This seems fun, I'd be interested in trying it out sometime. How do you go about it though?

Barbara said:

This seems fun, I'd be interested in trying it out sometime. How do you go about it though?

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If you're just starting out a good place to start is the Tulip kits. While the dye isn't super strong they do come out very nice, they'll just more of less fade over time. You can find a bunch of the kits at Walmart, they have small kits with just the primary colors and kits with like 10 different colors so you can get a bigger kit and do it with friends! You always want to use natural fiber shirts, cotton IMO is the best. I hear rayon works well too but cotton is easier to come by. Don't get any of the "sweat control" or specially treated shirts, it can affect the dye, so just look for normal 100% cotton tees. Usually you can find packs of them in the men's section. If you get a blended fiber shirt with polyester in it the shirt will dye but it will end up more pastel because the dye can't properly penetrate.

The kits come with pretty good instructions but basically you want to wash your shirts beforehand to remove the "sizing" on the shirt, which can prevent the dyes from soaking up correctly. You want to leave the shirts damp but not dripping, so basically just pull it from the wash and don't dry it.

Then pick a design, I suggest YouTube videos because it's much easier to see someone do it, the instructions have written How To's but it's confusing without seeing it. Its easy to do your own designs too, basically if you fold the shirt, draw on half of the shape you want, and then fan fold/pleat along the design until it makes a straight line and band around it, you can make he shirt have that design concentrically if you keep banding straight down from the line or you can swirl it or pleat it or crinkle it. There's literally no wrong way to do it though, no matter how you fold the shirt it usually ends up interesting.

Now if you got a professional kit instead of the tulip you'd have to soak your shirt in soda ash, which fixes the dye to the fibers and prevents them from coming out. Dharma does sell kits and it'd be worth it if you want to have shirts that last but with the Tulip kits the Ash isn't part of the process.

Then you want to mix your dyes, I suggest warm water to help the dye dissolve, but usually the Tulip kits never fully dissolve and end up with freckling, which can kind of look cool. For the professional dyes you add in a bit of Urea which helps the dye fully dissolve. Then you just have to apply your dye. I like to think of color palettes for each design, but I love rainbows a lot so it's hard for me to not go straight for them. XD But trying mixing different colors and stuff is really fun.

After you're done applying your dye you have to bag or wrap up your garments, I like using Ziploc bags and reusing them, and you want to leave it to soak for 12-24 hours, the longer the better. During the summer I like leaving mine outside in their bags since the warmth actually helps the dye soak in more too. After the time is up rinse and squeeze your design in the sink a few times before taking off the bands, this helps the colors from bleeding into each other too much, then rinse until the water runs clear, throw it in the wash and you have a really neat shirt!

- - - Post Merge - - -

Oblivia said:

Thank you! And yeah, I buy all my supplies from Dharma Trading Co. as well. I haven't found any dyes that compare to theirs, even if it's a bit more work to do all the mixing beforehand.



I'm so glad you like them, thank you! I think I kept a couple of those pictured, actually. Sometimes I dig the pattern so much that I can't bear to sell them. -_-

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I love tie dye but I hardly wear it, my boyfriend wears all of our shirts from the first two batches and loves them. If I did a design with a lot of black in it I might wear it, I just hardly wear colors. XD

I did it once when I was little. I'm not the creative type, so I'm not really one for that stuff. Lol.

Did a TON of shirts! I think we did 25 all together and a lot of them came out really awesome, going to put them in a spoiler because there's a LOT!