Supplies & Organization
Creating tie-dye takes a lot of supplies! First and foremost are dyes and soda ash. The dyes are fiber reactive dyes. If you go to my page about “How it Began” you will see the companies I buy dyes from.
These dyes require natural fibers and I use 100% cotton shirts. I prefer to use tag-less shirts. I hate having to fuss with the tag while I am dying. I buy my shirts online - Hanes or similar multi packs of white undershirts. I also grab them in multi-packs at Wal-Mart or Dollar General. I just bought some in the George brand from Wal-Mart and will see how those go.
Tubs - larger laundry tubs that I found at Dollar General - and racks are helpful for dying. I also bought a gutter piece from Home Depot I had my husband cut it into 3 pieces for incline dyes (Watch).
Cake molds - these are silicone flexible strips that can be shaped to form around your shirt for an ice dye. These are really awesome and I have two sets of them. Clothespins are also helpful for keeping the shape of the from and attach to the rack.
Kitchen gloves - I use Playtex living gloves to handle my projects. ***Believe me - you will have dyed fingernails and tie-dye hands if you don’t***
Homer tub from Home Depot. I have a 5 gallon tub with lid that I keep soda ash water in for soaking my shirts. I don’t snap the lid on but keep it over the top.
Squeeze bottles and small jars with lids - bottles for liquid dye and jars for mixing dyes and soda ash for hot water infusion. I have 16 oz, 8 oz and 3 oz bottles. The smallest bottles have needle tips for thickened dye.
Sodium alginate - used to thicken dyes. Add sodium alginate to water (use an immersion blender because the stuff will just glob up) to make thick water to keep a space white. The thickness will keep other dyes from seeping into the space. Add dye to thick water and you can create clearly defined lines in your dyes. This really helps when you do a stitched design
Hot Water Kettle (Electric) - I got this for doing hot water immersion. This boils water quickly and mine has a setting that will let me “lock” it at 160 degrees.
Tubs, containers and shelving units - I will be getting a shelving unit for my carport working area to keep my dyes, tubs, bottles and racks. I got drawer divider organizers to get my dyes organized by colors - pinks together, reds together..etc. I keep all my completed shirts in a dresser in my back bedroom where I do my painting and tying. I also want to get a shelf to keep my supplies for that room.
Fabric Paint - I use Jaquard Textile paint. This paint has to have several layers to be visible and must be heat set prior to washing. Paintbrushes for detail are helpful to be more precise. I also have six well palettes.
Crochet string, sinew and rubber bands - many dyers use kite string but I am using what supplies I already have at home. Sinew is for doing mandalas and geodes. It helps to have a puller. I use a tart press that is wood that I found on Amazon. The wood allows you to grab the sinew and tighten it. Sinew starts slipping around the original spool and can be hard to tighten. Rubber bands are great. I like thinner bands. I am still working on finding which ones are best.
Synthrapol detergent (or similar) - I typically wash my shirts when they are taken out of the packaging in either Synthrapol or All Free & Clear. (It all depends on how many shirts I am washing - 3 or less I use a capful of Synthrapol, other wise if there’s a lot of shirts, I just use a pod of Free and Clear laundry detergent )
