Dyeing the color wheel with Candy

I am in awe.

First of all I must admit that I’ve taken lots of online classes. What is better if you can’t attend in person, than to take a great class with a favorite artist on your own time and at your own pace?

Well, I’ve been dyeing fabric for over three years and loving it, but sometimes I just want to see how others dye. I’ve also been thinking about being more intentional with my art – seems like Lynn’s Intentional Printing book has really gotten to me!

I’ve been a fan of Candy Glendening for sometime now. I purchased her dvd Dyeing To Stitch: A Comprehensive Guide to Creating Colorful Fabric Art awhile back. It is a good dvd packed with lots of information, and introduced me to Candy’s work and her teaching style.

In my dyeing journey I continued to follow Candy’s blog. Candy teaches a couple online classes, and she had mentioned that she was putting together a new class,  Dyeing 103: Multicolor Cotton Fabrics and to email if interested. I checked yes and forgot about it. Then when I received an email that she was offering the class,  I just had to sign up. Since she’s in the process of finishing the class, she’s was giving (and still is) 30% off the class. Her price is reasonable even without the discount.

I am just overwhelmed at all of the information Candy gives in this class. She walks students step-by-step through the process with not just videos, but pdfs. She provides spreadsheets to calculate the colors. Her goal is for students to be able to create their own color palettes, but also get consistent results every time. I love to just toss the dye on the fabric, but the thought of being able to reproduce that fabric pieces is really compelling to me at this stage.

Our first assignment is to dye the color wheel. I’ve never done this and thought it would be so much fun. Also, I feel like I’m in a college class and I need to complete my assignments! I prepared my fabric and got my dyes all set and dyed my color wheel.

And, once they were batched, washed out and ironed, I was able to put together my color wheel chart. This picture doesn’t do this colors justice. Now I have this chart in my binder.  How neat!

And here’s another picture of my fabric.

But we are just beginning. There is so much Candy is covering in this class. Even though all of the info is overwhelming at times, I know that I can just stop and go back later. I’m excited to be able to really work with colors more.

Candy also works in exact measurements which include grams and milliliters. I’m no stranger to grams since we use those measurements in our soap making and know the value of being accurate in that craft. Using these measurements in dyeing is a new playground and mindset for me, but one I welcome.

If you are at all interested in learning to dye with fiber reactive dyes and want to get consistent results, check out this or one of Candy’s other online classes. I am still so impressed by all of the time and care she has taken to put together this learning experience. Are there other ways to dye? Sure. Can you dye without taking her class? Sure. But for me it’s so interesting to understand and learn from her dye process.

Candy did not ask me to post about this class. I purchased the class out of my own pocket. I just wanted you to know of a wonderful resource on dyeing available online. If you are at all interested in learning to dye or like me you want to learn her accurate way to dye, the 30% discount is still on. Check out her blog here.

I have some other projects to work on right now, but there will be more dyeing in my future. Have a great colorful day!