dying a navy dress lighter......and tye dying help!

[chimchar]

i have a long navy dress that i would like to tie dye....

am i right in thinking that if i tye up the dress and then use a dye remover the pattern left should be with navy circles or whatever.... what then about dying it a different colour? do i leave the bands on without undoing them iykwim?

is it best to use string or elastic bands to do the tie dye, and how to i decide what my pattern will be.

i've not done this since school, so am a bit scared rusty!!!!

any help appreciated.

i think you should experiment on a smaller piece of fabric. do some big, some small, close together etc.

you need to use rubber bands and tie them very tight to exclude the dye/remover.

what is the dress made of? synthetics like polyester will not work well at all unless you have a special dye ofr them.

ok. didn't think about the fabric...its 100% viscose.

will go and look at the dyes and see if it will do.....tbh i never wear the dress as it is because its just too "meh". have nowt to lose!!!

thanks for your reply.

i am not sure about viscose, can you cut a small piece of somwhere? like heam or seam? you would have to test it or have a bit more of a google.

am pretty sure you'd only be able to do it by putting it in bleach. you can't dye fabric a lighter colour without stripping out the original colour first, same as with hair. dylon are the most popular home dyes, but i don't think they work on viscose, only cotton.

dylon do a pre dye which strips the colour. you could either use this on the whole dress and then re tye dye it one or more colours, or as you suggest leave it tied up, in this way you would end up with another colour dress with navy stripes. it works on viscose

www.dylon.co.uk/products/dyes/pre-dye/pre-dye.html#instruction

i doubt it would go completely white tho. with such a dark colour as navy bleach would either turn it pale grey, pale blue or possibly an orange or yellow colour. depends on the navy dye originally used. hope this helps.

i meant to say, use the pre dye first, see what colour the dress goes and THEN choose the colour you are going to over dye it. because if you decide to go for say a green or purple colour and the pre dye makes it go orangish then this will effect the end colour and make it a bit sludgy. you would be better off dying it a warm colour say red, orange or yellow. does than make sense?

ahhh girls. you are bloody marvelous!!!!

i actually don't mind it looking a bit washed out or uneven in colour, so long as it looks like its meant to look that way! lol

think i might tie it up first, then use the pre dye on it and see what happens.....if it looks crap, i can always untie and re bleach until the tie dye has gone...

thabks again. trip to hobbycraft later then to peruse the dye isle!

btw another tip. if you tie the dress up dry you'll get a much more pronounce tie dye effect. it you dampen it first then your tie dye will look more smudgy, you can get some quite nice effects either way.

ALSO you might try dip dying. this would involve using two different dyes, ones that are close-ish colours work best, green/blue, pink/purple etc. you hang the dress with half of it submerged in the dye and give it a jiggly up and down every know and then. then you rinse it. turn it round and do the same thing with the other end of the dress. make sure there is a band in the middle with both colours over lapping. depending on how much you move it about you can get either a 3 stripe effect or a gradual fade from one colour to the other. dont use complimentary colours unless you want a brown stripe in the middle.

have fun!