• Hi, I am the owner and main administrator of Styleforum. If you find the forum useful and fun, please help support it by buying through the posted links on the forum. Our main, very popular sales thread, where the latest and best sales are listed, are posted HERE

    Purchases made through some of our links earns a commission for the forum and allows us to do the work of maintaining and improving it. Finally, thanks for being a part of this community. We realize that there are many choices today on the internet, and we have all of you to thank for making Styleforum the foremost destination for discussions of menswear.
  • This site contains affiliate links for which Styleforum may be compensated.
  • We would like to welcome House of Huntington as an official Affiliate Vendor. Shop past season Drake's, Nigel Cabourn, Private White V.C. and other menswear luxury brands at exceptional prices below retail. Please visit the Houise of Huntington thread and welcome them to the forum.

  • STYLE. COMMUNITY. GREAT CLOTHING.

    Bored of counting likes on social networks? At Styleforum, you’ll find rousing discussions that go beyond strings of emojis.

    Click Here to join Styleforum's thousands of style enthusiasts today!

    Styleforum is supported in part by commission earning affiliate links sitewide. Please support us by using them. You may learn more here.

Adventures in DIY Denim: Overdyeing

hi-val

Senior Member
Joined
Jan 16, 2008
Messages
418
Reaction score
1
Backstory: I have a pair of jeans that are very comfortable, but they're nearing the end of their life and ripe for experimentation. Since I've seen other posts about overdyeing here, but no real comprehensive explanation, I figured I'd do it myself and post some pictures.

Prior to dyeing the jeans, I got out the sewing machine and stitched up a small run in the knee so that it wouldn't fray out and be ugly. I put some stitches on either side of the run. Did I mention that this is kind of a pain ********** to do? I couldn't get the darning function on the machine to work for me so I had to position the fabric awkwardly. Anyway, excuse the blurriness:

p1010158hp9.jpg


It's black thread, but as you'll see, it turns out to be invisible.

I also put in a bit of research into what dyes to get and how to do it. I found this site to be very informative:

http://whatiwore2day.blogspot.com/20...ing-denim.html

I used Dylon dyes; they can be found at Jo Ann Fabrics and lots of other places. For reasons I can't grok completely, they're better than RIT because they can dye in warm water, not just boiling, like what RIT needs. I weighed my pants on a postal scale but if you don't have one, you can basically count on them being a pound. I used two packs of dye, as each one dyes 8oz of fabric. I used a blue and a black (which is actually very dark blue) for this pair.

Here's the before:

p1010161mo8.jpg



Here's a picture of the dyes so you know what to look for. Also note that there are rubber gloves. These are essential if you don't want to have gangrene-looking hands. These were latex gloves, but I'd go further and get those long yellow rubber ones that the mom on Dexter's Lab wore. They let you get more into the agitation without staining your skin.

p1010170os7.jpg


I followed the steps on the site I linked to earlier. They do a better job of explaining it than I do. If you're doing this, make a paper funnel out of a sheet of paper to pour the dye powder into the 2L pop bottle, it makes a significantly smaller mess.

And speaking of mess, this is a subtly messy job. I got spatters of dark blue dye on the floor and countertops, but luckily it wiped up. If you're doing this, wear an old shift of clothes and make sure you are in an unstainable location.

The instructions say to agitate it continuously for the first fifteen minutes, but since The Office was on, I only agitated it during commercial breaks. This consisted of putting my hands into the bucket with the jeans and kneading it like bread, swishing it around, etc. The rest of the time, I occasionally stirred it with a stick.

For rinsing out, I was surprised at how much water it took to get mostly clear. I filled the bucket up with about a half gallon of water and swished the jeans in that, then dumped it out when it looked saturated. When it was mostly clear, I took it downstairs and put it in my washing machine, by itself. I ran it in cold water for a full cycle and then put it in the dryer. Neither piece of machinery was stained by the dye.

Final result inside:

p1010171jl3.jpg


I'd like to note that it's hard to get a good photo of exactly the color. This is the closest I came:

p1010179li5.jpg


You can see that it's a really inky, consistent color. I'm very pleased with it. It lacks the high-chroma blue of indigo, and it's got kind of a matte finish to it. I'm interested in how these jeans wear.

The dye cost $3 and the gloves $1, so overall it was a pretty cheap project for an hour of my time.

Hope this is helpful, I'm happy to answer questions.
 

Dedalus

Distinguished Member
Joined
Sep 14, 2007
Messages
2,592
Reaction score
3
Originally Posted by hi-val
You can see that it's a really inky, consistent color. I'm very pleased with it. It lacks the high-chroma blue of indigo, and it's got kind of a matte finish to it. I'm interested in how these jeans wear.
Not to mention, both the warp and weft threads are dyed as opposed to just the warp. Are you going to starch these jeans, to get a complete the faux dry feel? Great thread. It looks like a fun experiment, and gives me hope for my raw jeans once they have become too light, like playing Mario and Zelda again after you beat them the first time.
smile.gif
 

shellshock

Forum Mascot
Joined
Jun 6, 2005
Messages
1,104
Reaction score
2
Originally Posted by hi-val
These are essential if you don't want to have gangrene-looking hands.

i've dyed some shirts before. getting gangrene hands is half the fun!
 

Pilot

Distinguished Member
Joined
Jan 13, 2008
Messages
2,653
Reaction score
349
they look good, almost like a charcoal
 

Ludeykrus

Distinguished Member
Joined
May 27, 2007
Messages
2,256
Reaction score
4
Good EDU thread. Great pics, good description.

I'm glad to see others making use of their time and skills rather than giving up the easy way. I'm especially impressed with the color the dye produced! I'll definitely be doing this when I wear my jeans out!
 

bob

Senior Member
Joined
May 23, 2006
Messages
188
Reaction score
0
I tried dying a pair of apc's that i no longer wore black. Only thing is that the thread they used doesn't take dye. Poly-something or other. So now i have a pair of black jeans with gold stictching. Looks too silly to wear, but no big loss.
 

Arethusa

Distinguished Member
Joined
Mar 9, 2006
Messages
5,073
Reaction score
73
Originally Posted by bob
I tried dying a pair of apc's that i no longer wore black. Only thing is that the thread they used doesn't take dye. Poly-something or other. So now i have a pair of black jeans with gold stictching. Looks too silly to wear, but no big loss.
Sharpie.
 

Chinook

Senior Member
Joined
Mar 11, 2008
Messages
278
Reaction score
0
I have always thought that each pair of jeans was unique in it's shade of indigo. These ones definitely take the cake.
 

tagutcow

Distinguished Member
Joined
Nov 29, 2006
Messages
9,220
Reaction score
625
I might try this with some old pairs of Eddie Bauers or department store Levis I have hanging around. I wonder what the effect would be like if you lightly bleached the jeans first.
 

Godspeed

Well-Known Member
Joined
Sep 23, 2007
Messages
55
Reaction score
1
i will definitely try this in the future. it looks like the finished product is wearable and pretty cool.

i wonder if there is a similar DIY to make waxed cotton garments??
 

onion

Distinguished Member
Joined
Aug 26, 2007
Messages
3,047
Reaction score
3
I have a Marc Jacobs denim jacket I'd like to try this on. I'm not sure if I should resell it on ebay and make a few dollars or dye it. As it is, it's a washed out light blue, and I would like for it to be deep indigo (or really any other color than it is now
plain.gif
). I wonder how dark you can get the denim if you dyed it a few more times.
 

hi-val

Senior Member
Joined
Jan 16, 2008
Messages
418
Reaction score
1
As a side note, I was looking for authentic, natural indigo dye and it's really hard to find. To make the dye, you have to ferment the plant in a vat. There are freeze-dried dye crystals I found online but they were sold out and $30. The pants don't have an indigo look per-se as much as a dark blue with greys and charcoals in it.

If you're trying to go for pure indigo, do 2 packs of indigo blue or find some natural indigo. Those would be my wide-ass guesses, at least.

Godspeed, you've got me thinking. The way to do it, I think, would be to dissolve paraffin in a volatile solvent like acetone or alcohol, then dip the denim into the solution and let the solvent evaporate out. The other way would be to rub the denim with paraffin wax and iron/hairdry it in.
 

datasupa

Senior Member
Joined
Jul 11, 2006
Messages
773
Reaction score
1
Originally Posted by Dedalus
like playing Mario and Zelda again after you beat them the first time.
I don't think this analogy quite applies in this case--I would hesitate to declare the OP's pre-dye fade a 'victory'. It might be more accurate to compare the re-dyeing process to taking a mulligan.
 

erdawe

Distinguished Member
Joined
Mar 8, 2008
Messages
2,084
Reaction score
15
Originally Posted by datasupa
I don't think this analogy quite applies in this case--I would hesitate to declare the OP's pre-dye fade a 'victory'. It might be more accurate to compare the re-dyeing process to taking a mulligan.

Why is it that every post I've seen you make is overly critical and adds nothing positive to any thread? Is this just your nature?
 

Featured Sponsor

How important is full vs half canvas to you for heavier sport jackets?

  • Definitely full canvas only

    Votes: 55 36.7%
  • Half canvas is fine

    Votes: 59 39.3%
  • Really don't care

    Votes: 15 10.0%
  • Depends on fabric

    Votes: 26 17.3%
  • Depends on price

    Votes: 26 17.3%

Forum statistics

Threads
505,131
Messages
10,578,706
Members
223,885
Latest member
Garyypangburn
Top