The sails are printed

From here to a printed length this week. Five separate paper stencils, 5 different mixes of Procion P dye, carried on to the cloth with Manutex paste, ( I can't find an internet link about this method) lots of measuring, and it does approach the initial design.

Detail



Detail, showing scale of image



Full length of cloth, showing dye testing on the bottom selvedge



The advantages of this method are: it doesn't need huge amounts of water; the dyes are very true to their final colours during the printing process; mixing the colours is very straightforward and subtle variations are easily achieved; the overlay of colours is subtle; the hand of the fabric isn't changed.

The disadvantage is that the dyes have to be fixed with steam, which is fine in the studio which has a bullet steamer, but is a bit more unwieldy at home.

Lots of learning in this exercise about working with paper stencils, overlaying colour, measuring up a repeat, managing a long length of fabric. More to come hopefully as I have now cut a set of these shapes at 200% of the original size.