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| Yoshiko Wada explains intricate shibori techniques in Lauris |
Yoshiko launched us into her course with this statement...leaving traces on the fabric. During the International Colour Forum in Lauris this October, Yoshiko held two workshops on Shibori for novices like me.
Folding the fabric regularly, irregularly, or sewing up small sections to prevent parts of the fabrci to enter into contact with the dye: a thousand ways to create textile designs with dyes.
We worked on a piece of silk organza. This very fine fabric is actually fairly stiff for its thickness, because of the presence serecin, a protein substance produced by the silkworms.
Firts we folded the fabric and clamped it with different shapes - I chose the O.
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| It takes lots of hands to clamp several pieces together! |
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| Two O plexi shapes are clamped tight on my piece |
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| Then we placed the wetted fabrics in a bath of soda ash. |
Contact with the soda ash removed
the serecin and softened the silk
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| Yoshiko wraps around my piece for arashi shibori on a PVC down pipe! |
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| Then slides up the fabric tightly and gathers it in a diagonal direction, tyeing the bundle up with string. |
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| I dyed my piece in a bath of madder, rinsed and dried it. |
Then I got carried away and didn't take photos of the arashi result!
Next step, I dyed the piece in indigo and here is the result.
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| The indigo blue turns out stronger on the serecin ladden spots. Madder arashi shibori designs come out through the blue in purple brown shades. |
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| Enthusiastic encouraging reaction from Yoshiko |
After all these years of experience, Yoshiko still enjoys the surprises of shibori and shares her passion for this technique and natural dyes.
Watch out it is contagious!
To find out more about Yoshiko's activities here
