Fabric dyeing

Unfortunately, due to the pandemic online shopping is currently nearly the only possibility to shop, but that also means no touching whether the quality or the thickness of the fabric meets your expectations and no seeing whether the color or, for example, the size of the pattern is really what you want.

I unfortunately have already had some unpleasant surprises. I have received fabrics that of course were beautiful, but just not at all corresponded to what I thought to have ordered. Therefore, I thought, why not order a fabric that you already know and love, just not in colour, but in white and then just try out what colours you can get with dyeing.

I for example do love BLUE, but my favorite fabric – a cotton twill that is wonderfully soft, has a nice drape, but is still that stable that I do not have to line my skirts – currently only comes in navy blue, which is super nice, but which I have used soooooo often that it is getting boring.

So now what?

Answer: Liquid textile dye 😉
The washing machine looks clean after dyeing and the associated post-wash, yet I would not wash white immediately afterwards, but rather wash dark laundry first.
(With dry textile dye, which you should also be able to use in the washing machine, unfortunately leaves significantly more colour in the machine, so I would only use it for dyeing e.g. in a bucket.)

For my first attempt, I combined two shades of “blue”, namely Royal blue and Caribbean turquoise. The colour that should result from it, I could try out (at least roughly) on the manufacturer’s website via a colour mixer. The result is not quite as indicated there (had expected it to be a little bit more greenish), but there are many factors involved and as I already said: I love blue, nearly every nuance of it, so I’m not really disappointed.


As a curious person, I really like to watch


how the color is distributed in the machine


and the fabric


gradually takes on the colour


and the result slowly becomes imaginable. 🙂

Points that determine the colour:

1. Material: Cotton takes colour very well, but also absorbs quite a lot.
I have also tried to dye a cotton-polyester fabric once, but unfortunately only little colour remained in the fabric, so it was not worth it.

2. Weight of the fabric you want to dye: I dyed 2.5m here (1m = 311g = 777.5g total weight).
One pack of liquid textile dye is enough for 600g, according to the manufacturer you may use max. 2 packs at the same time, which is supposed to be enough for 1200g.
My experience: If you want a really rich color, take 2 packs

Tip: Pre-wash also new fabrics, the colours will come out more uniform, as this washes out any residual “chemistry” from the manufacturing process!

My next attempt will be a mixture of: Night Blue and Opal Petrol and I am already really excited! 🙂
And what about you? Have you become curious and want to try your “own” colours too?