Help! Need to Dye without Buying Acid Dye Online...

[shiny_glor_chan]

Hi! So, I'm going to NYCC (a really last minute thing, or this problem would not have occurred, I assure you, @_@), and I pretty much have an Oswin Oswald costume put together, except

Comments

[crescentwench]

regular craft stores may not have it, but if you have any locally owned boutique knitting/yarn stores, they may carry it.

Also, what kind of fabric is the dress? You may not even need acid dye - most natural fibers take dye well, and you can even use RIT or Dylon dyes, which most grocery or fabric store carry, with protein fibers if you use lots of vinegar to set it properly.

[shiny_glor_chan]

Thanks. I'll check into that.

Nah, it's 95% polyester with 5% spandex; it needs the acid dye, unfortunately. My Dylon dye didn't take at all; I was at least hoping it'd make it a shade darker, which would've been good enough since the dress is almost red but not quite.

[ixtli_awakening]

I second the recommendation to call around to local knitting/yarn/fiber stores.

Have you tried Utrecht (either location in Philadelphia)?

[laughingmagpie]

I'm worried that acid dye won't do this job for you if it's a polyester/spandex blend. Acid dyes work on wool, silk and nylon (so, nylon/spandex blends are okay). But polyester is a different kettle of fish.

For poly I'd recommend either RIT or Dylon (though results are sometimes still disappointing) and you need to make sure it's really hot, like boiling. There's also iDye Poly that they sometimes carry at Michael's. I used some iDye Poly on some actual plastic the other day and I was quite impressed with it.

If you really think Acid Dyes are what you need, then I'd try quilting/weaving/spinning/yarn stores (since wool works very well with Acid dyes, so those guys tend to use them).