Sunday, April 3, 2016

Space Dyeing a Twisted Hank of Yarn

When I overdyed my handdyed roving in a braided hank, I did it partially because I was lazy and didn't want to risk felting the fibers.  I was also curious about "tie dyeing" yarn.  What ways can I manipulate yarn and unspun fibers to leave white spots as I dye them on the stove top?  First up, twisting yarn into a hank and then space dyeing it with Easter Egg Dye Pellets.


I selected colors that won't break (red, yellow and orange) because I wanted to get a sense of how the spacial relationships would penetrate the fiber.  


I love space dyeing with these warm Easter egg pellets, it gives a sunrise effect to the yarn. 


Video Contents:
  • [0:00] Introduction 
  • [1:21] Twisting the Skein 
  •  [2:24] Setting up the Dyebath 
  •  [4:44] Adding the Dye Pellets 
  • [6:11] Turning off the heat 
  • [6:55] Washing the Dyed Yarn 
  • [8:08] Final reveal and conclusions 


Filming these dyeing experiments is a lot of fun because I'm never entirely sure how the fiber is going to come out.  The penetration of the colors was better than I expected but I think I would like this technique better on unspun roving than on yarn.  This repeats on this colorway are not going to be regular, so it wouldn't work well for socks or mittens.  I think that I may end up overdyeing this later on, but I am still happy that I tried the experiment.  


What would you knit out of this colorway?  I think my default for variegated yarns is to make another hitchhiker scarf, but I'd love to hear about your favorite projects for multicolored yarns.