Dyeing Batting with Rit

Now that my article on low immersion dyeing with RIT from the December 2008 Quilting Arts magazine has been published, I can show you photos of the artwork I made for RIT to use on a segment of Quilting Arts TV for season 3. The third season should begin in January. The episode that RIT will be on also happens to have the segment that was taped in the spring at Quilt Festival Chicago where I demonstrate making Fiesta Ornaments.





These circles are cut from dyed Warm and White cotton batting and stitched with a blanket stitch on the sewing machine. If I had an easier time with hand work I would have loved to do all the stitching with embroidery floss to really make the stitches stand out. Dyed batting can be like a cheaper softer substitute for doing wool appliqué.

I think dyed cotton batting would make a great substrate for needle felting. I can imagine a whole landscape made from pieces of dyed batting and embellished on a felting machine with ribbons and roving for trees and flowers.



You can see the back of the 9 patch is one piece of dyed batting cut with a prairie point style edge. I used a leftover block cut in half on the diagonal to make the corners for hanging, with a piece of painted balsa wood to rest on a nail in the wall. This is a super easy way to hang small fiber art.

On the left is a detail from the abstract piece at the end of the article. The wavy lines of color running down the center is the dyed fusible interfacing. This is the soft nylon interfacing that is usually meant to be used with knit fabrics.

Below is a detail from the flower piece. The flowers and leaves are cut from batting and the centers of the flowers and leaves are fusible interfacing.