Dragonfly Dress

Here’s the dragonfly dress that required several days of pasting using my favorite stencil, Donna’s dragonfly.  Each time I pasted a section, I had to wait for it to dry before moving on to another part.

Charles Dips in Indigo

My friend, Charles, also loves indigo dyeing.  He pasted several items and came over so we shared a big dipping day in the vat!

Canoe Rack for Drying

Here are a few of his treasures drying in the sun.  Charles was making holiday gifts, well in advance of the season.  Actually, in 2011, we discovered that the best time to dip was on a blisteringly hot day.  That’s because the pieces with resist dry more quickly so we can get more than one dip in an afternoon.

Dragonfly Dress – Early Dips

Here, you can see the graduated colors that occur with multiple dips.  However, since the dress is long, dipping only the lowest portion required a little help.

Getting Taller

Every home should have a tallish step stool so the dipper can be taller than the vat!

Dragonfly Dress – back view

Here’s the back view of my dragonfly dress.  It was finished in time for me to wear it to the costume party for my dance group.  The theme was “the blues”.  I love this dress.  Having an indigo vat inspires me to buy white garments so I have more stuff to dip.

I hope that I can keep this year’s vat going into next summer.   I’ve never before gotten such dark blues from one of my vats!  If you have a chance, think about taking a class from John Marshall or Karen Miller.  You will be glad you did!