Fun With Fabric Paints

I had to take a break from boxes (sort of, I did make one box you'll see later) and got the urge to do some fabric painting. Plus I was feeling really guilt for not getting my blog drawing fabrics in the mail yet. You may remember that I did the fabric dyeing in November and I still do not have everything in the mail.  I gave Mary her backing fabric when we met earlier this month but the other 4 are still here. That's because I was not happy with some of them.

I am please with both of these sets and decided to leave them alone. The top set is a gradient of yellow to red and the bottom set is a pastel color wheel. The gradient is the first one that I have done that I felt turned out "right" and I really love the soft colors of the pastel set and I dyed these after I purchased purple and green dyes from Dharma. Before I had been mixing dyes for my purple and green but my color mixing testing convinced me that pure purple and green dyes and paints are worth having.

 

   

 

 

The third set of fabrics for the blog drawing were dyed using Ann Johnston's color parfait technique. I decided to tart two of them up with some painting. I used primarily Stewart Gill paints on these using Metallica, Pearlize, Alchemy and Colourize in various blends. On the one on the left I used a combination of stencils and stamps. The stencil worked great but the stamp did not. I actually had to go back and paint in all of those squares! I will not do that again. You can't see it in this picture but there is a smaller square stamp and some brush strokes over the entire piece. The one on the right has a base of brush strokes in a darker metallic with splatters of silver Metallica.

Next up are these fabrics that I dyed trying to get "sky" images. the only one that turned out good and I left alone is the one on the right. The blue on the left came out darker than I wanted so I lightened it up with some sponging over the dark areas using either Alchemy or Pearlize or both - I can't remember. The one in the middle was dyed using a recipe in Ann Johnston's book called "sunrise". It came out pink and gray. When I saw the sunrise photos on Randi's blog I had my inspiration. I painted over the pink and gray with DyeNaFlow paints and improved that fabric greatly!

Next on the agenda was another box - see, I told you there were more boxes! This is a tissue box for my tiny powder room that I keep decorating. I bought this fabric in Houston from Jeanette's Fabric to Dye For. She has the most beautifully saturated hand-dyed colors I've ever seen and she had a table full of these awesome metallic fat quarters. I bought two of them. This one was purchased specifically for a bathroom tissue box! I figure that I spend a lot of time in there and want to have some pretty things to look at.

The metallic fat quarters are $8 each - quite pricey for something that I might want a lot of! So my next painting assignment was to try to mimic the look. I didn't quite get the look that Jeanette has for her fabrics and her fabric is much stiffer but I sure do like what I did get. I started with these:

I did not use the dark blue/green one that is third from the left. After a big mess and lots of fun I ended up with this!

Aren't they cool! I laid them out backwards in this photo to the fabric on the far left in the top picture is the same as the fabric on the far right in the bottom picture. I used a combination of Jacquard and Stewart Gill paints. I thought I might use up the Jacquard paints but, fortunately, I have a lot of paint left to do lots more of these. Can't you see this as a good way to rehabilitate bad dyed fabrics?

Comments

[Marie]

You never cease to amaze ! Will you take a break for Xmas ??!! What's on your Santa list?

[Sue B]

Gorgeous, gorgeous, gorgeous! All of it is fabulous. Those fabrics in the last photo are awesome!

[Angelcat]

Wow your fabrics in that last picture are spectacular and I love your tissue box too. Happy Holidays!

[Joanna van Ritbergen]

These are all really lovely. How'd you do the last batch with the metallics?
Love em

[Terri]

Love the tissue box. I think I saw that fabric booth in Houston. Your painted fabrics look awesome. I especially love the one on the far left.

[Cindy]

Way cool fabric, Vicki!

[Randi]

They are all yummy looking, Vicki! Love the sunset ones! Merry Christmas!

[Debra Spincic]

You are so right--a new cure for ugly fabric!

Merry Christmas (if you can take a break to enjoy it!)!

[Deb Levy]

Your fabrics are gorgeous...you're getting good at this girl!

The box is pretty too! You're like the energizer bunny! Merry Christmas!

[Mary]

I've been spending time with the kids rather than on the computer but caught up really quickly. I like the hand dyed fabrics and I'm sure the recipients will love them as much I loved my backing.

I don't know how you find the time to do all the different projects you work on. The boxes are really cute.

I don't count anything but fabric in my stashbusting...I'd be in trouble esp. if books counted - I bought 4 quilting books the other day in just one visit to the bookstore.

[beth]

Merry Christmas!

Everything is beautiful--wow! Are you going to take a break soon?

[Wanda]

I bought one of Jeanette's fabrics too at one of the shows. they are luscious.

Your "metalized" fabrics are great too.

[kim]

My, you've been busy!
Happy Holidays Vicki!

[Kate]

Those are fab - I will have to ask you (later, when I have some free time, ha ha) more detail about what you did, as I'd love to get some results like that.

[Summerset]

I love what you did with that last set! Excellent way to recycle those dyed fabrics that didn't come out quite right.

[Sarah]

Vicki - you've done a FAB job on these fabrics!! Stunning results!

[Judy Rys]

Great job with the fabric. I also bought several of Jeanette's fabrics at PIQF. They are gorgeous!