This Second's Obsession

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Julianne

this dyeing obsession

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After my successful shirt-dyeing session last year, I became obsessed with Dylon Intense Violet and started to plot further dye-based adventures. I went through my wardrobe and picked out all the things that I liked, but didn’t love because they were white, pale pink, a pale shade of grey, or otherwise Not Purple Enough.

I wrote down the fabric composition of each item, and then I loaded up the Dylon website and added to my list the best type of dye to use for each item. I decided to start my quest for purplefication with three items. This was mostly because Hobbycraft only had one box of Intense Violet machine dye left, and after the tedium of stirring last time, I decided that I would avoid future hand dyeing whenever possible, so I picked out the items that would get better results from hand dye and resolved to do the rest in the machine.

I checked the weight of the fabric by putting it into a jug on top of electronic kitchen scales. Do not attempt to use bathroom scales to weigh your fabric. They are too imprecise. The first item I chose, along with the scales and jug:

 
This cardigan was a faded pale pink hand-me-up from my sister and had quite a few random yellow or brownish stains. It’s a really good fit though, so I didn’t want to throw it away. Perfect candidate for purplefication, and 100% cotton so ideal for machine dye. The other two items I forgot to photograph before I’d already put them into the bowl, but I did take a picture before adding the dye.
The grey angora/wool/nylon blend cardigan, according to my research, was better suited to hand dye because of the natural fibres. I had no idea how it would come out, because of the nylon content. The other item was a white leotard, or as Topshop (and other brands) insist on calling them, ‘body’. Come now. A body is the thing that goes inside the leotard. As you would expect, the leotard had lycra in it, and apparently lycra does not get on well with high temperatures and agitation, so hand dye was again the best option.
So onto the results! The cotton cardigan came out beautifully.

In the photo it looks like the middle section is pinker, that’s just my camera. It’s actually the same fabulous shade all over. All the stains have disappeared and the whole thing looks refreshed and ready for many more years of wear. A+++ would dye again.

 
The grey cardigan turned out much better than I was hoping. It’s came out more of a pinkish shade, but it’s still pretty uniform.

 

 

Again, the glowy pinky section in the middle is down to my camera.
The leotard did not come out as well. It’s quite patchy, especially by the seams, and the thread it was sown together with didn’t take the dye (it’s probably polyester), so now it stands out, white as before.

This time the colour variations are not down to my camera. It actually looks like this.

 
I’m not really concerned though because a) I was never going to wear it as-was, there were too many stains and b) I’ll probably wear it under a cardigan or another top, which should hide the imperfections.
All in all, I’d say that this session was very successful, and I look forward to even more adventures with dye! I’m going to write a post with all my fabric dye tips, so if you have any questions, leave a comment or tweet me!

 

Monday Amusements 10

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A little preview from an upcoming post about afternoon tea!

It’s that time again! This week’s post is a bit make-up blog heavy, cosmetics have been on my mind even more than usual as there are a couple of products I’ve nearly used up (!!!), which means that I can almost justify buying more!

I’ve also felt encouraged by Lipglossiping‘s ‘Starting out? Build your stash without splashing the cash! post. The part about looking at what you already own and thinking about what you use the most has really stuck in my head. I used to feel alternately excited and guilty about all my make-up purchases, but hang on, I really do wear all those purple eyeshadows, and I have nowhere near enough to bury myself in. That said, I think it’s time to face up to the fact that I prefer bright over dark for lid shades and to either stop buying so many pretty dark eyeshadows or wear them more often. I’m going to make an effort to get more use out of them and if I can’t manage it within a couple of months, that’s it. I’m not buying any more, no matter how pretty they might be, I know they’ll just sit in my stash, mostly used to darken the outside of an occasional crease, and only rarely taking on a starring role. The ones I already have will last me forever at this rate. The same goes for blues, greens, and pinks. Although I’ve yet to find the properly pigmented bright blue of my dreams (I thought it was NARS Outremer but I swatched it in Selfridges and it is not true to pan!) I probably have enough of the others.

I enjoyed reading Part 1 and Part 2 of Makeup Savvy‘s 10 Things I Hate About Makeup, I agree with everything she’s written in those posts, especially with her point about the increasingly high prices of High Street brands. Why are so many mascaras so expensive now? We all know that the profit margins on cosmetics are huge, even when they’re made in the UK. There are a lot of special offers in Superdrug and Boots, but they never seem to come at the right time, so I’ve resigned myself to stocking up when I find them cheap. My last five mascaras were free with magazines, or from the Boots bargain bin.

Meanwhile, this look on Glitter is my crack… is really making me want to get out The Only Orange Eyeshadow That Doesn’t Look Terrible On Me (the matte orange from the Sleek Circus palette) and do a sunset look again! The first time I tried it was for a gig and I loved the results at first but got a bit tired of seeing the orange every time I looked in the mirror! Maybe I need to tweak it so that there’s only a tiny bit of orange visible!

Though I’m going through a pastel obsession at the moment, I expect that I’ll be back to my usual black-loving self in time for summer (that’s if we get one, it’s been warm lately but it’s looking drab again outside my window now)! There’s something about wearing black in the sunshine, especially with hot pink. I’m going to keep in mind Hellcandy‘s Glitter goth tips NOTD for when I want to wear black nails with all my pretty summer dresses.

On the subject of goth, as usual I’ve been enjoying Sophistique Noir‘s Red and Black Week. I didn’t take part this year for two reasons, a) I forgot about it til part way through and b) I haven’t bought anything new to show off since the last time! I was on a hunt for red things to wear to a party a couple of months ago, but everything in the shops was too orange. Oh well, I’m sure blue-red’s time will come again!

While we’re on clothes, I loved Debutante Clothing‘s photos of the 1920s-style Sue Wong‘s Fall 2013 collection preview. They make me itch to go to Prohibition again.

Lipglossiping‘s post about the first day of her recent trip to Paris has got me craving steak frites. I’m not sure that I’ve even had steak frites before, though I used to love Wetherspoons’ steak and chips! They’re basically the same thing, except French and therefore probably less cooked and in a yummy sauce, right?

Finally, a pile of corgi puppies! Ahhhhhhhh too cute!