Oh BOy! It's Soy!!! Workshop

What a fabulous weekend I had learning new techniques, making new friends and making big messes, and some pretty cool fabrics as well!!! Textile Artist Lynda Prioleau gave us her all and led us thru the fun and mind warping somersaults of planning that is at the heart of complicated surface design and batik..

As we created our complex cloth, Lynda had use post the pieces on the walss of the Artistic Artifacts studio. It did not take long to cover the walls with color!!! Isn't Lynda Beautiful???

On Saturday we began at the begining, with Lynda showing us the in's and out's of working with Soy wax and the miriad of ways to apply it to fabric.

We mixed up dye as well!!

Then it was our turn to play and play we did!!
Wonder of wonders we actually have evidence of Judy taking some time for herself and away from her demanding job as Proprietess of Artistic Artifacts, to play in the wax, paint and dye! Judy created some amazing fabrics and we know that we will be able to get more evidence of her creative time!!!


Artistic Artifacts has the perfect setup for a full scale workshop. We hung our drying fabrics, in all stages of production, in the loading dock area to catch whatever breezes were available!!! The hotter the day the more vibrant the dyes. Needless to say we got some vibrant color!!!!

We used donut cutters, jar lids, the ends of empty spools,wood stamp blocks from thailand,rubber stamps, paint brushes,potato mashers, whatever we could put our hands on, to create pattern and design!

This was my first piece of Soy Wax complex cloth. First I applied soy wax with a paint brush in a swirls pattern, then dyed the cloth with yellow procion dye. After removing the wax with an iron and newsprint, I applied more wax using various tools to create rings and circles and splatters. then I brushed on blue dye and red dye.

Our class creations!


> I created this piece using soy wax and textile paints. I plan to spend quite a bit more time exploring the possibilities of Soy and Paint.

FOr this blue piece above, I started with a periwinkle blue fabric and added wax and dyes. Staring with a piece of colored fabric completely changes the scenario and adds so many possibilities!!!
Here are my washed and completed batik samples from my two day workshop with Lynda!!!

This piece is my favorite! I spent a very long time creating this piece, and by doing ,so I really got the process of layering color and using eh wax to protect the previous applied dye, worked out in my head!!!

I am already planning on working with Soy Wax!!!! The dyes are ready, the fabric has been treated with soda ash, all I need now is a big Block of time. A clear falt surface would also help, but that is another issue!!! :)

New Projects!

This past weekend I took part in a new venture being launched by my good friend Judy Gula at Artistic Artifacts. Judy will now be offering a selection of wonderful "artsy- Classic" patterns for creating clothing using hand crafted and embellished fabrics. Judy specializes in hand dyed vintage fabrics and wants to encourage all of us to create marvelous clothes that speak of our passions. She asked a group of us to pick a pattern and create garments that we would wear to unveil her new direction for her business, at an Opening Event. Judy and her Mom put on a wonderful Opening Tea on Sunday last! It was such fun to wear my new shirt and to see all of the incredible garments that others had made!!
I went thru my extrensive stash of fabrics and chose a wonderfully vibrant Red Linen/Rayon blend fabric that I had picked up years ago in Oklahoma. ( I really am Stash Busting!!!!) Just this past June, while at a Quilt Expo, I met the wonderful Proprietress of Batik Tambal, a business that travels the world collecting wonderful Batik panels for use in the sewing arts. You have probably noticed their adds in Quilting Arts magazine amoung others. I bought 6 small panels (they were 50% off!!) knowing that I had to have them but not sure what they would become.

As I love the color combo of red and turquoise, I went for bold and beautiful ,and chose the above panel to bead and embellish to put on the back of my shirt.

Once beaded, it looked like this:

I had another panel with similar colors that pictured two masks. As I knew that I wanted to put some sort of embellishment on the front of the shirt as well, I cut that panel in half and beaded it.
Here is the half panel to be placed on the front.

So at 11:30 am Sunday morning I was still stitching on the last little details!!! The event began at 1pm Sunday afternoon!!!!
I had hoped to have a nice pair of black slacks to go along with the shirt but everyone felt that the shirt went great with Jeans and could also be dressed up with black pants!!! Good thing, as making another garment was just not in the cards for this time!!!!

As I was not at all excited about putting a last minute button hole right on the front of this piece (for fear that I would mess it up) I went with a more creative closure. I used a vintage button (again from my stash) and made a beaded loop using beads in the same color scheme as the batik panels. This small detail has become my favorite part of the whole piece!!!

I did not take as many pictures of all of the other wonderful garments at our show but I do have a few to share. I got swept away in looking at all of the marvelous details and talking with the creators to have time to bother with lots of pictures.. Here are the few that I did take!! .


This is a detail shot of a glorious silk shirt made by my wonderful friend and sewing Mentor. Jean Trammel. Jean is an amazing artist, beader and seamstress extoirdinaire who is an invaluable resource and source of encouragemnet for all of us. She did this wonderful japanese embroidery work on the yolks of this piece! Simply Stunning Work!!!!
this shirt was created by another wonderful artist and new friend Lynda Poole Prioleau. Lynda is an amazing textile artist as well as a phenomenal singing talent, who teaches several classes at Artistic Artifacts. A textile class with Lynda is an incredible treat!!!!

With my fresh experience with clothing design and creation, I plan to forge ahead and make the garment that I spoke of in the previous post. I'll be making use of my collection of hand dyed linens and sunprints!! I hope to have results for you by sometime next week!!!

Art On all and have a great week!!