Shibori: My New Hobby

I made this yesterday.

When I was in Jordan I discovered “Entwinements,”Karren Brito’s amazing blog, and for about a month I looked at her directions for making shibori scarves. I love the texture, and besides I can’t see turning down a silk scarf.

So I ordered 12 silk scarves from Dharma Trading. Their prices are great, and I had the scarves in 3 days.Here is the scarf on the first run through. I did not dye, discharge color and over dye. I dyed the whole scarf this awful florescent green, and then I over dyed with brown and 4 other variations of green. I wasn’t ready on my first try to give discharging a try. Perhaps next time. I have 11 scarves left over, and Miss Carousel’s birthday is soon…

The most time consuming part of this process was wrapping the pole. This is how the resists are created. I won’t restate badly what Karren Brito explains so well on her blog. Needless to say, this is the thankless part of the process.

Once the scarf was pleated up on the bias like this I added the brown and green dyes. Then I put a plastic bag over it and put it outside for a few hours to steam in the hideous SoCal heat. After that I washed it and then I steamed it again, and wrapped a towel around it and rolled it so the pleats would be squished in.The most difficult part was waiting a day for the scarf to dry. I was finished at about 3 yesterday, and I unwrapped it this morning.

And here we are.





I am thrilled with this. The resists mostly resisted the second layer of dye, giving the scarf just touches of the bright green under the more toned down greens and brown. I love it.