Looking for someone to dye some trim

[cosgood]

Chums,

I am looking for someone, with experience dying period wools. I have some 3/8" tape trim and wool sutash trim I need dyed red for some zouave coats, I can only get the sutash trim in natural color, so I have to go the route of having it dyed. I have tried several samples using rit dye and acid based dyes made for wool, and get the same pinkish color results. I have $400 worth of trim, and dont want to ruin it, and need someone with knowledge of dying processes etc.. to produce a red dyed trim for me that wont fade. If you know anyone etc.. please contact me at caseyosgood@yahoo.com

thanks,
Casey

[flattop32355]

Check with Terri Lawson (forum name = Spinster).

[cosgood]

I had thought about contacting her, I guess I should give it a try, but figured I would entertain others offers as well.

[KathyBradford]

She's the best, Casey. I use some of her hand-dyed wool yarn, and it's gorgeous. It's worth protecting your investment by having her dye it. She's a busy lady-in-demand, though. I hope she can do it for you.

[Spinster]

I'm not on this forum much anymore--just a quick skate-by looking for dye questions and answers.

This one is worthy of a larger philosophical discussion.

And, in the end, what I'm going to do is tell you why you don't want me to do this job.

First, what's wrong with Casey's home process is part of what he has already learned.

Rit will not do this job--wrong kind of dye.

The various modern wool 'acid' dyes --Lanaset, Gaywool, Cushing, can do this job with proper fiber prep, but a tightly woven twilled tape is going to need more than just an acid bath--its going to need Sythrapol, and perhaps even a boil out in another stripper. These processes can change the texture of the tape and cause it to fuzz up and shrink, even with careful experienced handling.

Now, all these are fine modern dyes--AND I DON'T TOUCH THEM. You think my lungs are screwed up and cranky now from being stupid around dyepots in the early years, you just don't know the damage I could have done to them messing around with modern dyes. I've used them in a workshop setting with masks, chemical hoods, and such. Not fun and not me.

Which leaves me with period dyes. I could do an absolutely fabulous spot on job of period dyeing this trim-----------but it would not look "right" laid up against a modern dyed piece of fabric--the color would look weaker, softer in color value than the modern fabric, even though it was a whanging red.

It would first take a good bit of experimenting with the trim, and learning its particular capacities. I dye wool from one breed of sheep--its how I know what it will do in the pot consistently. And, with any natural dye, there is color variation.

I cannot dye to color swatch--my operation is too small, one large pot at a time.

And with any natural dye "won't fade"--nope, can't guarantee that one. Its the nature of the beast, and I can't control how folks treat a textile after it leave my hands. Guy thows it in the back glass of the SUV for a month, yep, that red's a goner.

Now, there are some folks that do have the capacity to handle this job in a natural dye. Ben Tart's operation is large enough, if he is willing to run a red vat. Red vats are dang expensive to run---what cuts cost is the need for weaker dye baths in the same color range--and there ain't much call for military pinks............

But, if you are laying this tape up against a commercially dyed fabric, a natural dyed trim is a poor idea---you want a modern acid dye.

Contact the John C. Campell Folk School, at http://folkschool.org/ Browse through their catalogue looking for modern dyeing classes. Ask to talk with someone in their instruction department--get contact info on some of their teachers and start looking from there. My first thought is a production weaver named Kathryn Webber Scott who teaches for them. Her dye processes are primarily cotton, but she has the capacity to do large quantity, as she dyes 1000 end varigated warp chains 100 yards at a time.

So no, this ain't gonna be an easy or cheap process. Dyeing yard goods is wayyyyy more trouble and work than dyeing yarn goods.

Not to shut the gate after the cows have dissappeared down the road, but this is the sort of job better approached by buying the yarn color you need, hand in hand with the custom weaver who is going to make the tape.

[cosgood]

Thanks for the reply. When I got the tape trim, they said I couldnt get it custom dyed, I tried to go right to the source for it. Anyhow I bought all the trim undyed, so I could get it to match. I dont know if you were talking about matching it up to other red dyed trim, but that wouldnt be the case. Unfading, I was talking about in just normall wear and tear type situations, not extremes, I understand it will fade some. Anyhow if you could period dye a nice red, I would be all for it, as said previously the only thing this will be going on is dark blue wool, no other reds to match.


Casey

[Spinster]

Oh well now, that's entirely different. Just a nice red is doable.

So many folks want a very particular thing--sorta like the fellow who brought me a fine vintage blanket with red and white stripes, and he wanted it to be all red--and all THAT PARTICULAR RED. Not happening.

Last weekend a fine feller brought me in a piece of yarn handling equipment he'd made for me from a picture. Fine thing, but he had no point of reference for size, so its way bigger than the norm. Just the thing for reeling wool tape into skeins for dyeing.

Private message coming your way.