Name: Rachel 
Message: I looked through your site and did not find an answer to my question, hopefully I looked hard enough and you will not be answering it for a second (or third) time. I run a very small tie dye business from my house and would like to beging tie dying leotards. Unfortunately it has been very hard to find 100% cotton leotards. I wonder if you would tell me if I will have more success (using ProMX dye) with one of the following fabric mixes: Cotton/Lycra; Cotton/Nylon; Cotton/Poly/Spandex; or Cotton/Spandex. Most of my options are at least 75% cotton. Thank you very much for taking the time to read my e-mail, I have found your site to be very useful


Essentially, all that matters is the percentage of cotton. You're not going to be able to dye polyester or spandex. (Lycra is just a brand name for spandex, a type of polyurethane also known as elastane, so it makes no difference whether they contain Lycra versus spandex.)  

75% cotton will usually dye adequately, though the color you get may be slightly paler or duller than that of 100% cotton. 80% or 90% cotton is better: get the highest cotton percentage that you can. 90% cotton dyes just about as well as 100% cotton. Often the spandex fibers are actually wrapped in cotton, so you see them only when the fabric stretches, anyway.

Avoid polyester whenever possible, because it is not dyeable except under harsh conditions that destroy spandex, and it's too much trouble anyway, as polyester is far more difficult to dye than cotton. Nylon requires low pH conditions to dye, the opposite of cotton, as well as additional heat, so it will be more convenient not to bother with dyeing that, either.

Spandex is very heat-sensitive, so it is important to use cold water dyes when dyeing lycra blends. Your choice of the Procion MX type dye that PRO Chemical & Dye sells as PRO MX dye is an excellent one. You should do very well in dyeing 90% cotton/10% Lycra or 88% cotton/12% Lycra with this type of dye.

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