These are the rovings that I dyed at the Saturday workshop. Well, not the brown, that's just natural colored alpaca. This is the first time that I haven't overdone dyeing my roving. In the past they have been nearly felted, would break easily, and have been very hard to spin.Everything that we dyed had a vinegar soak to start with.
Top left yellow was held in a simmering kettle for about 3 minutes and then allowed to dry on the racks. The orangey one was spread out and hand painted with yellow, pumpkin, and red, and then nuked for 1 1/2 minutes in the microwave. I also did a purplish one in the microwave that isn't shown here. After everthing cooled off naturally, we gave it a rinse in a bucket of plain water. I had quite a bit of color come out.
Now, I think that these all look and will spin nicely, but I'm not convinced that they will retain the colors well. Will have to wait and see but I am envisioning colored fingers while spinning.
3 comments:
They turned out beautiful. I'm glad they're spinnable; I hope the colors are permanent, too!
I keep forgetting that you'd had this problem--if you like, I should maybe get some alpaca roving and try dyeing it myself, to see what happens? And if it turns out okay, I can let you know what I did. Now to put that in the (ever-increasing) project queue...
They turned out great! I hope the color stays put! I would love to learn how to dye, but can't find a class here. :-(
Those are really pretty. But how can you improve upon the natural colors?
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