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Re: random bleeding of dye
I
can't speak for the randomness of the fugitive red, but I can say that I never
wash fabric without a color sheet in the washer with it. I also recommend
to my customers to use a color sheet for the first few times they wash their
quilts. I believe the color sheets are made by Shout. I find them in
the laundry soap isle of my grocery store. To date, I have not had any
bleeding problems.
Best
regards,
Sharron
Hello,
I am posting
this on behalf of a quilter. The problem is random bleeding of colour in some
quilt blocks that she has already spent a considerable amount of time working
on. She prewashes her fabrics in cold water with vinegar. This is followed by
rinsing. If the colour runs she continues rinsing until the water runs clear.
She has used this method for many years working with fabrics from a variety of
sources and has never before encountered problems with the dye bleeding
randomly afterwards.
In this
instance she used "Easy On" spray starch on a few colours to facilitate
working with small pieces. Then she washed the quilt blocks in cold water to
remove the spray starch. Upon final drying some dye bled from the cranberry
and some similar colours but only in random areas. There was no correlation
with fabrics to which spray starch had been applied and seemingly no
correlation with any other factor (such as thickness of fabric).
She was able to
remove much of the dye bleed by further washing in cold water but had to
take apart some of the blocks to replace areas that remained stained or to
prevent further staining
Does anyone have an explanation for the randomness?
Any
suggestions to prevent this from happening again?
Jan
Vuori
Senior Textile Conservator
Canadian Conservation Institute
1030
Innes Road
Ottawa Canada K1A 0M5
tel: 613 998-3721
fax: 613
998-4721
www.cci-icc.gc.ca