Sort of sad

This is the piece of work I made on India Flint's course a few years ago in Horsley, Gloucestershire. It was a lovely time with good companions and an amazing teacher in a beautiful peaceful setting. This cloth is important to me as a reminder of that time. There is also a photo of it in the Blurb book India put together of students work 'On a Wandering Wind'. The little beastie clothes moths have been feasting on it, this upset me but it also gives me an opportunity to work on the cloth again and add some remnants to make it whole again and maybe to bring back memories.

Quilt and Textile show

We would like to thank everybody who visited our stand. We had a fantastic time talking to such interested and interesting people,  so many lovely compliments about our space. Hope to see you all again next year.

Rust, weathered and worn

Leaf print

Tea and Rust

Sun flares

Some more work for our exhibition, I forgot to take photos before I framed two of these so sorry for the reflections. The skeleton leaf is a print, something I learnt at an Alice Fox course http://www.alicefox.co.uk and then had a fun day practicing with my friend Liz Hewitt. The picture includes the original leaf.
The weaving is a small piece with rusty pieces and tea stained.
The last photo is another reassembled bark cloth piece and rusted cotton piece.

Quarry Exhibition

Cards in progress

Sinclair Taylor

Stephanie Wooster

Vici Campbell

Joan Hall and Helen Nock

Gail Darke and Linda Haile

Linda Haile

Debbie Pawle, Gail Darke, Simon Taylor

My stand

Jack Hicks

Gail Darke, Simon Taylor and Emma Lomax

Sorry if I have omitted any names, but I think that is everybody. Some amazing and unusual work here. There are some more images on my fb page: www.facebook.com/debbie.weaver.1884
and details of opening times etc on the poster.

Eco printing/dyeing - some thoughts

Recently I have been slightly disappointed with the results of my eco printing especially compared to many of the results I have seen on fb and other blogs where the results are amazing with beautiful colours and prints. It seems many practitioners are now using iron blankets, iron water or ferrous sulphate. I am not criticising the use of these I am partial to using a little iron water now and again.  However I am not sure that I would want to use these in my practice when I am dyeing a wearable item, which is the direction I am moving towards. I wouldn't want to wear something against my skin that had been in contact with iron.
I guess I will to have keep to my subtle colours, which I do like, or move to Australia.
If there is anybody out there who achieves amazing prints and colours without using anything other than plant material I would love to know your secrets.

Open studio

 I have been dyeing scarves for my studio opening, woad and pomegranate.

Eco dyed clothes and cushions

 Some photos from the studio opening, last day tomorrow.

Liz Hewitt, eco dyed and indigo dyed scarves

And a small piece of weaving, working towards future exhibitions now.

South West Textile Group at Westonbirt

Skirt, top and scarf

This is my piece for the SWTG exhibition at Westonbirt Arboretum which opens today from 10 until 4 finishing on 20th of this month.
 I have seen some of the other work being displayed and it looks like its well worth a visit. See their website for general information http://www.forestry.gov.uk/westonbirt

Indigo

After my last experiments with indigo dyeing I wanted to try direct printing with the plant.  I am quite pleased with the results, but they are more faded than I would have liked so I need to work out how to get more intense colour. Its all experimental as I don't really know what I should be doing. If anybody out there is also trying this I would be interested in their methods. I bundled mine in the usual way and then put them in a pot with a fairly gentle heat for about two hours, it took a while before any colour came through. My friend Liz has also been dyeing with the plant so I am looking forward to seeing how she did.

Blouse dyed from previous indigo dyeing session
with leaf printing round hem

Hem

Plant dyed silk noil

Love the colours just need to be more intense

Saved

Tie dye organic cotton scarf

Rescued by my friend Liz who just happened to have an indigo kit. We had a fun day despite choosing the only day of the week when we had rain, so controlling the temperature was difficult.
I also dyed some papers the next day. The indigo was by then exhausted and although I got good results on the paper the fabrics only came out the palest blue.

I have also been dyeing a few silk scarves with plants from the garden.

On its third dye, looks better now, was
very nondescript before its indigo dip.

Very pale and pretty, garden flowers overdyed
with indigo

This one is also an overdye

A bit of a hippy top

Silk scarf, leaves and rusty pole

Dyed with horsetail and garden flowers

Failure

I watched my beautiful turquoise water (see previous post) turn to murky brown. This was my first attempt with indigo and I have noticed that many people either dye with the indigo before or after bundling with plants. When these have dried off a bit I will unravel and re dye in the indigo remembering to add vinegar, it helps if you read the instructions first, and see what happens.

Conundrum

 How do you tell when a black tomato is ripe? I can't find the packet so don't know what they are or how big they are supposed to get. We have had glorious weather recently so I have been out in the garden most days.
Still managing to do odd crafty things as well, two dyed scarves curing before being washed, hope they will retain the colour.

Dyed with mare's tail and hibiscus

 Rusted covers for notebooks awaiting their waxed finish

Rusted washers and tin lids

 Another one hopefully rusting away

disposable barbecue found on the beach

 Woven friendship type bracelets

Cotton ribbon and silk threads

 Bundles in an indigo bath heating in the garden.

This is a liquid indigo extract that I bought from http://www.dtcrafts.co.uk/

A couple of days before the weather changes and it starts raining, desperately needed, but a few more sunny days would have been appreciated as I have quite a lot of clothing waiting for the dyepot.