I’ve been a tie dying shirts and marbling fabric for over 17 years. I work primarily with cotton and silk fabrics and use the two distinctly different techniques of Marbling, and Tie Dying to create beautiful works of WEARABLE ART!

My explorations into the world of fiber art and dying all began somewhere back in like 1985 or 86 when I made my first tie-dyed t-shirt with some friends of mine. It wasn’t as nice as the work that I do now but it came out pretty cool anyway, not bad for a first timer. Flash forward a few years and several dozen shirts later and I’m making tie-dyes pretty regularly for a couple of local eating and “socializing” establishments. Some of the basic stuff like how to dye a spiral was pretty straightforward and easy to figure out. Whenever I saw a shirt that I liked and I didn’t know how to make I would figure out how it was done. I learned how to fold and dye shirts in enough ways that I could take a hundred shirts and make them all look different. Lot’s of my friends kept telling me I should be doing this for a living. Me, I was making tie dyes for beer money and for cash to go see Dead shows and other concerts. Today I offer those same quality dyes I sold at the shows right here on the internet in both Short Sleeve and Long Sleeve.

Sometime around 1990 my friend Doogie gave me a used marbling kit he had. From the first time I tried it out I was hooked! Unlike Tie Dying where I had to wait till the next day for my colors to set before I could unfold a shirt and see the results with Marbling the end result was viewable in an instant. You see with tie dying it’s just that, folding and binding or tieing a shirt in a certain way, then applying dye and waiting for the dye to set before unfolding and eventually viewing the shirt. The process takes hours. Now with Marbling, it’s completely different. All of the waiting is in the beginning of the process during the prep work.

First I thicken water using a “food grade” thickening agent, basically powdered seaweed or moss. It’s the same kinda stuff used in foods like ice cream or jelly or sometimes even beer to make them a little thicker. Once I’ve done that I take some water based dyes or inks or sometimes acrylic paints and float them on the surface of this thickened water. If ya wanna be technical this thickened water is now called a “size”. I carefully place the colors on the size. This is called “throwing” the colors because if fact that is what I’m doing. Using a straw whisk or an eyedropper I carefully or sometimes recklessly toss my colors on the size. I let the natural surface tension of the thickened water determine how the colors will spread and then using a stylus I manipulate the floating colors and swirl them around to form intricate patterns. For me a stylus can be a simple thing like a knitting needle, or a chopstick, or even some bent wire on a stick.

To form some of the traditional and more complex patterns I use a rake or comb that I’ve made myself. I then gently place a piece of pretreated fabric on top of the floating colors. The fabric soaks up the dyes and the pattern is transferred to the fabric. Lift the fabric off, rinse the off the size in water, and Whamo! Instantly I get to see whether I‘ve created something beautiful or, as can sometimes happen when the Marbling Muse is not smiling down upon me, if I have created a dripping wet - dye running off it- Mess! That’s marbling in a nut shell.

I had no idea when I began Marbling the depth of the intricacy and the beauty the wondrous world of marbling held before me, I had just opened the door. Over the years, through trial and error, I learned to if not master at least tame and control the fickle art of Water Color Marbling. With research I discovered the history of this art. The roots of Marbling can be traced back to the Fifteenth Century. Marbling or Ebru from a Turkish word for cloud art, was used for centuries to color mainly paper. Traditional patterns can be extremely intricate and can require lots of practice. Today using water based Eco- Friendly Dyes I can marble a variety of fabrics and paper. From simple beginnings I have researched and experimented with this art of marbling to where I now consider myself a fiber artist. That’s me, Edwa.

Well that's a little "tail" I like to call The Kitty Story.

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