Sun Printing

I did some sun printing during the three days of sun we had this summer. Absolutely loved it and will be repeating it the minute it's sunny and hot again.

Here are some useful resources:

• a video showing sun dyeing in speeded up version.
• a video explaining sun dyeing in more detail and shows some interesting techniques including swirl and scrunch effects.
• sun dyeing with acrylics instead of special paints.

And these ones explain the science behind it:

• http://www.pburch.net/dyeing/howtodyewithlight.shtml
• http://www.pburch.net/dyeing/dyeblog/C557981556/E20130702081959/index.html

I used Colourcraft Silk Paint.

My results were very pleasing

Various trials on the go

This one came out well and I love the blue

This one didn't come out so well in the end, not enough definition

Curling soft leaves

The stripes from the John Lewis bag showed through to the print

My scrunch effect

Some learnings:

• it needs to be hot as well as sunny
• when the conditions are right the prints will dry really quite quickly - especially on thin silk
• soft leaves curl up in the heat
• this might seem obvious but the sun moves around a lot so you may find things end up half in the shade in no time, keep budging them around unless you have a huge garden
• something light/dark in the background will have an effect - dark makes the colour more saturated
• don't wet the fabric first and then try to lay it out on plastic - it's worse than treacle
• masks that are absorbent will pull the dye away from the surroundings leaving a halo effect
• acrylic paint doesn't work at all well

Roll on next summer...

Flour Resist with Dye and Fabric Inks

I've been getting interested in resists and tried out flour paste as a means to enhance printing and dyeing.

It's quite easy but takes a bit of time.

Pin out a piece of cloth onto a sheet of plastic and onto something with give (I used a scrap of carpet underlay) - as the cloth dries it will shrink so the 'give' is important

Mix 1:1 flour and water - it should drip out in a solid fast drip as per the picture

I spread the mix out with the back of a spoon

Some tools to mark make  

I wrote out some words with a kebab stick

Some more mark making with a cookie cutter

Drying out in the airing cupboard - beware, the smell of the flour mix will linger for months after

When the paste is dry it has a kind of sheen on it

Detail of the dried marks

You can see the curvatures of the shrinkage and how it tugs at the pins

Detail of the marks

Scrunch up the cloth

Cloth after scrunching - brush away the 'crumbs'

I used fabric paint with a brush, really pushing it into the cracks

The back of the cloth once painting has started (I should have put a protective piece of plastic on the table)

This is the same but with dyes

The dyed piece ready for drying and batching

The dried fabric painted cloth - I have started crumbling off the flour

Flour mostly removed

Detail of the cloth - I've left little bits of the flour for texture

I tried removing the flour by washing instead with the dyed piece but it gets very 'gluey'

The finished dyed piece has some delicate colouring

The finished painted pieces - front and back

Beware of flushing the flour mix crumbs down your sink or in your washing machine as it could block your drains.

I found the results really interesting and have used one piece already to resolve.

Here are some other things you can do with flour resist:

Leslie Tucker Jenison Flour Paste Resist turorial

Maree Martin on YouTube

Jamie Kalvesrtan Design

Jane La Fazio