So what comes to mind when you think of silk? Usually it’s something luxurious, smooth, rich and self-indulgent. Silk is all of those things. It’s also crazy strong and dye-able. Here is what I did with my samples: I dyed both types of silk , I used both acid dyes and direct dyes in the same colorway crimson from the same company to see what the differences would be. The brand of dyes was Cushings as they are a local company to me. Here is what happened: !st photo acid dyes on left, direct dyes on right , 2nd photo mulberry top acid-dyed, next row 1st photo tussah silk direct dyed, 2nd photo mulberry top direct dyes.
I was trying to figure out what I wanted to do with the fibers I spin small portions of during my “Oh The Fiber” series. I’ve decided to leave them all on the spindle as singles and when I am done ply them and use them as a giveaway. Some of the fiber will be used in next weeks colorway as I needed acid dyed crimson.
Here is what spinning them produced.
The Tussah silk on top the mulberry top is on the bottom.
The silk noil is quiet springy and fuzzy, the light peach color of the direct dye part didn’t want to show in the picture. The mulberry top is quite slick and shiny. Both wanted to spin thin but the noil because of the shorter length needed more twist. The brighter colorway(acid dyed) mulberry is going into this weeks Butterfly Collection Colorway.
Tags: animal rescue, animals rescue maine, bombyx mori silk, fiber processing, silk, silk spinning, tussah silk, wild silk
