Week 26-1: Dye the feather!

After I put feather into the clear organza part on my toile, I could estimate how much feathers roughly I need to dye.
I added extra amount (almost double amount) for just in case I made wrong panels, or need to make more samples, or something. It is definitely better than less because I do not want to do dyeing again.

So, I went to the dyeing room with a pillow.

Feather is of course from animal protein, so I used Acid Dye which is used for dyeing silk.

First, I need to soak all feathers with soap water. 

While it absorb water, I prepared 4 bowls for dyeing a lot at once. I thought I could use a dye sink, but I did not want to have a problem which is easy to guess that feather may stuck drain pipes.


Put hot water and a spoonful of salt into each bowl. Wait until nearly boiling.


 

Put dye from pale yellow powder because simply we cannot dye from darker to lighter colour.
Put feather into the bowls, keep temperature nearly boiling (like wool dyeing), mix slowly and check the colour often.

After it became appropriate colours, scoop them with a sieve and rinse with cold water and squeeze.

The process is simple, but it took a whole day and the horrible chemical smell made me sick.

After dyeing them, drying them up is another nightmare. I needed to mix them up everyday because I had no space to spread out them in no wind. But still, my room became full of feather.