Friday was all for experimenting in the dye room! As it was the last day before the Easter break (so the last day for access to the dye room for the next 2 weeks) I wanted to get as much of my dying experimentation done as possible!
I started out dying cable ties purple- which tuned out to be a surprise, I had no idea they would take the dye so well and so quickly!
Initially I tried an equal mix of blue to fushia red but it came out blue, every time. I later found out that this was because, contrary to its name fushia red comes out purple! The eventual mix I came to that gave me the perfect shade was;
The Mix:
1tsp Kemtex Royal Blue synthetic fabric dye
6tsp Kemtex Fushia Red synthetic fabric dye
500ml Water
Salt
Dip dye the cable ties for no more then 20 seconds - they take up the blue much faster then the red so if you leave them in longer they go blue!
I discovered through exerimenting that i could dye the ties to different shades and intensities of purple through how long I dipped them, and that when put together they created a really impressive effect.
I went fabric shopping on Thursday and found a range of 4 different fabrics, three in white - a synthetic lining fabric, a satin lining fabric, and silk habotai - that were of the right weight and sheen for the effect I need. The third was a synthetic lining fabric in almost the exact shade of pink I need! The hitch being it is a synthetic lining fabric, and so far I haven't been able to make it accept the black fabric dye, and after trying for an hour it had gone a dark purple but that was all
After an afternoon of experimentation I finally found the mix close to the pink that I need - the closest I can get to a dark neon! I tested three different types of fabric - a polyester lining fabric, a satin lining, and silk habotai! The silk habotai worked the best by far.
The Mix:
4 tsp Kemtex Fushia Red
500ml Water
3tsp Kemtex Scarlet Red
500ml Water
Salt as required
Mix so there is 1 part scarlet red mix, 2 parts fushia red mix with salt as required. Again, the silk habotai takes the dye very fast - it needs to be in for 8 seconds and NO MORE! Any longer and it goes red. Immediately rinse with water, and scrub with soap flakes to remove extra dye and you are left with a deep vivid pink!
I am going to try experimenting at home with Dylon to see if I can get the colour perfect but as yet this is a brilliant shade just a bit dark.
Now I need to find the way to dye the centre black. I need to experiment with dip dying and different dyes (starting with Dylon)
SATURDAY
Saturday was for research to making and materials! I spent the majority of the time researching where to get the right length and price cable ties. I am set to need 10 per cape (230) with another 25 for the Giant Slug (Total of 260)
The length of cable tie that I need is 43 cm long - and I have found that I can get all the cable ties that I need (for the individual costumes and the giant slug) for less then £10 online! Which is a great relief considering the amount of different items I need to budget in between the individual costumes and the giant slug.
SUNDAY
Today I have spent researching
High Vis Jackets/fabric
Silk Habotai
Tinsel/streamers for the slug trail
To start with, the best place and prices to get silk habotai at the right width! I have checked online and the consensus is that the average height of a 10 year old is 138cm, and the average arm span is 140cm. Minus length of the hands, the head height, and making sure the capes are high enough not to trail across the ground that means I need 1m of 140cm wide silk habotai per cape! Which means overall I will need 23m of 140cm wide silk habotai overall for the 23 capes.
TO EXPLAIN WHY I AM NOT USING THE UNI STOCK OF FABRIC -
The AUCB haberdashery stocks silk habotai at £5.80 pm with 115cm wide. This is 25cm too short to be used as the arm width so would be the length of the cape, but this would mean that for every cape I would have to buy one and a half metre's. This comes out as £8.70 per cape just for the silk, which makes it almost a pound more expensive, and too long in terms that it would have to be cut down by 15cm for the length and 10cm for width of the cape making for lots of excess wasted fabric. Therefore it is more economical to use the £7.99 fabric at 1m per cape.
This is NOT including the giant slug, as this will need to be at the minimum 3m long and 140 wide, but with the giant slug the challenge will be to make it more length around the edges then the centre so that it will billow the way that it needs to.
High Vis fabric/jackets! I have looked up a variety of ways and places to get high visibility fabric and jackets to see where is best, which is cheapest and how to get them and I have discovered a website selling high visibility clothing that is selling large sizes of high viz vests for £1.99 each! From the projected size I am hoping we can use half a jacket per cape! I will need to do some mock ups on how to get the most spots out of them. I also plan to see if I can get some jackets for cheaper or for free if the local motorcycle training centre has any they are getting rid of, or if I can find anywhere else that is giving them away but at the moment this is what is coming out at the best price.
Streamers! I looked at tinsel, party streamers and in the end I have found doorway streamer curtains (3ft wide to 8ft long) where 3 of them in a row will be the right length and effect to create the slug trail of the giant slug! They look brilliant and thankfully also come out best in terms of budget too.
ITEMS FOUND:
SILK
CABLE TIES
HIGH VIS FABRIC FOR SPOTS
STREAMERS - SLUG TRAIL
ITEMS LEFT TO FIND AND PRICE:
Ridgelene
Velcro
Elastic
Cake cases
Swimming hats
Plasterzote 3mm - Visiting the scrap store in Poole for prices!
Despite the amount of research I've done on the best places to get what I need cheaply, and substitutions where possible, this is going to be very tight on budget!
INITIAL BUDGET ESTIMATE - working out at £43.97 remaining after currently found materials...
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