I’m doing some dyeing with new-to-me dyes. I know of other weavers who use these WashFast dyes (labeled Nylomine), so I thought I’d give them a try, but that wasn’t the main impetus. It was because of the pairing of WashFast dyes and the Pantone forecast for spring 2014. It’s a PDF, so I can’t post the exact link, but it’s first on this page.
I’ve ordered the dyes, made a plan for getting samples done, and started Sunday. Right away, I was concerned. But first, going back a bit, I have the wool color card from ProChemical for these dyes and had noticed that nearly all of the colors were dyed at a 1.5-2% solution. Most all of the dyeing I do is at 1%, so that’s how I’m doing my samples. From the first weighing of the dyes, I noticed that it seems to take more dye to reach that 1% amount. I also noticed that when the dyes are added to the water in the pots, they look anemic. So, I decided to do a little research about the difference between WashFast dyes and the Lanaset-type I’ve been using (ProChem calls them Sabraset). That led me to Paula Burch and her All About Dyeing website. What I have discovered is that these dyes may not be as washfast and lightfast as the Sabraset dyes. I’m going to forge on though. Dyeing all the reds now, but then I’m going to clean out those pots and start with yellows, moving up the list to darker colors.
By the way, I knew about Paula’s dyeing website but had forgotten about what a wealth of information it is, from descriptions of dyes to methods to book reviews, it runs the gamut. Check it out.