I must admit that the extended lockdown in my state has impacted my creativity. I have struggled to stay positive. It’s hard work to stay focused. But luckily in the medium of quilt making there is plenty of other work to do away from the design wall. Personally, when in doubt I like to hit the dye studio. Creating new fabric to use in my compositions does not require the same kind of mental energy and emotion as starting a new piece. And I have adopted a new attitude in my dye studio that gives me more freedom and allows me to work faster.
I still remember when I first met quilters who dyed their own fabrics. At the time my twins were 6 and my daughter was 4. My initial thought was how will I ever have time to make a quilt if I also have to dye my own fabric first! My second thought was how will I be able to cut up a fabric that I dyed if I really liked it and didn’t know how to reproduce it? While these thoughts reflected my total ignornance about dyeing fabric, they also drove me to learn. I took one or two dye classes while living in New Zealand, but didn’t really enjoy it much. Dyeing is messy. I choose fabric as my medium over paint for a reason! Then I learned about a class that taught you how to not only dye fabric, but also how to reproduce colors. Now this was exactly what I wanted. The class was Color Mixing for Dyers taught by Carol Soderlund.
I took my first class with Carol at Nancy Crow’s Barn. In one week I created a recipe book with samples for over 1000 colors. It gave me a strong foundation to build on, and formulas to help me achieve the desired results. I highly recommend Carol Soderlund as a dye instructor. She is absolutely amazing and her breadth of knowledge is most impressive. I have seen students bring her fabrics and ask her why the fabric turned out as it did. Carol could always answer them. For example I showed her a fabric that turned out incredibly blotchy. In several places this hot pink fabric had white splotches. She immediately asked “Did you cure the fabric in the sun?” I replied, “Yes, why?” She answered, “It’s blotchy because some of the fabric dried out in the heat.” Just one glance was all she needed. I have taken most of her classes, and hope to study more with her in the future. If you have the opportunity to study with Carol, take the class!!
For over a decade I faithfully used the formulas I learned in Carol’s classes with great success. And as is usual with most skills, the more I dyed the better I got at dyeing. I also started to notice more in the work of other dyers. I had a friend I met at the Barn, Barbara Bugliani, whose fabric was particularly unique. We had both studied with Nancy Crow and had been in some of the same Soderlund classes together. Her colors were subtly more complex than what I was producing. Last summer I asked her how she was creating such rich colors.
Barbara is a retired elementary school art teacher who has worked in many mediums. First, she mostly dyed by eye. Also Barbara rarely used only three primary colors. She would usually mix two shades of the same primary color in her dying. And she added drops of chino, grape or silk black. Her answers gave me greater freedom in my dye studio. So I took this new information and added it to what I had learned from Carol Soderlund. I measured less, mixed more and started creating colors that were slightly more complex.
The last new change in my dye studio was repeatedly going back into my dye bathes. Instead of laboriously measuring out each gradation of a color, I simply started with 500 ml of dye on a 180 WOG cloth. When I took out the first cloth I added a new piece of fabric to the dye bath along with a little more water. I could get 6 to 7 gradations from each of these. If I got bored with the gradation I would throw in a little more dye, gently transforming the hue. So much faster, and definitely more fun.
So I have found a way to continue to be productive despite these uncertain times. It is not how I originally planned to spend my spring, but at least I am still moving forward. How are you keeping yourself moving forward?
