How can I dye a polyester comforter set? What fabric would be easier to dye?

Name: Alaina

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Country or region: USA

Message: I want to dye the white parts of this polyester bed set to a coffee/latte brown. If I use a disperse dye, will it change the black parts, too?

You will not be able to dye that bed set at home.

You are correct that disperse dye is the only sort of dye that can be used successfully on polyester. Unfortunately, however, disperse dye (including Jacquard's iDye Poly) does not work on polyester unless you keep the dyebath at a boil for the full dyeing time (half an hour or longer). This means that you cannot successfully dye polyester in the washing machine or bathtub.

Dyeing a comforter like the one in your picture would require a huge cooking pot, which, like all dyeing pots, you should not plan to reuse for food. The cooking pot would need to be large enough for the comforter to move in freely, in the mixture of dye and water. My three-gallon cooking pot would not be nearly large enough. A comforter will barely fit into my twenty-six gallon top-loading washing machine. The cost of a sufficiently large cooking pot, one large enough to allow you to dye a comforter, would be many times greater than the $59 cost of the entire bedclothes set in the link you sent.

Good luck in finding a comforter set that is either the color you want it to be, or that is made of an easily dyeable cellulose fiber, such as cotton.

Instead of dyeing, you could choose to paint the lighter portions of the comforter set with a fabric paint. The results would be somewhat uneven, not a smooth solid color, however. Comnsider this as an option only if you would like a mottled effect. See "Fabric Paints: a different way to color fibers".

By the way, if the comforter set were made of a dyeable fiber, such as cotton or rayon, dyeing it with a coffee brown color would not change the black portions to anything but black. Dye can only change textiles from a lighter color to a darker color, never from a darker one to a lighter on.

Thank you so much for your reply! I will look for a cotton set similar to this.

Another question: what would be the best way to dye a large item such as a comforter like this? I want to try something cheap, and I've heard black tea can dye cotton, but I'm not sure how much I would need, or how I would go about making enough hot, black tea to dye it.

The best way to dye a large item is to use a cool water fiber reactive dye, such as Procion MX dye. This dye is not fixed with heat, the way all-purpose dyes such as Rit are, so it will not require a large cooking pot. Instead. Procion MX dye is fixed with sodium carbonate, a common household chemical found in washing soda. This makes it much more practical and easy to work with. You probably will not be able to find Procion MX dye in your local crafts or sewing store; if not, you will need to mail-order it from an art supplier or a specialized dye supplier. See "Sources for Dyeing Supplies Around the World"

In contrast to Procion MX dye, tea is not a very practical form of dye. It requires a large cooking pot to apply it in, since the dye and fiber must be heated together, and it's not very permanent, tending to wear off in the laundry. You can use tea to temporarily dye fabric to a light beige or tan color, but not a darker color such as a medium brown or dark black. Some dyers warn that the acids in tea may degrade cotton fibers over time, though I am not sure how much of a problem this really is.

To dye cotton, first be sure that the fabric has not been treated to make it stain-resistant or wrinkle-resistant. Stain-resistant finishes are the worst, because they repel both dye and water. Wrinkle-resistant finishes are not as bad as stain-resistant finishes, but they do tend to make unexpected lighter-colored blotches where an uneven application of the surface finish repels the dye partially.

For a perfectly smooth solid color, use a top-loading washing machine, if your items to be dyed will fit into it loosely enough that the fabric can move freely in the water. The large amount of water and constant agitation help considerably in making the dye color as smooth and even as possible. See "How can I dye clothing or fabric in the washing machine?".

For a more interesting mottled or multi-color form of dyeing, the easiest method is low water immersion dyeing. See "How to Do Low Water Immersion Dyeing"

. You can use a bucket, washtub, bathtub, or large unused plastic trash can.

Looking at your link, I see one very major problem. The care instructions say to dry clean only. You cannot dye anything that is not washable. This comforter set is not washable, although it's made of cotton, which is usually washable. In the case of a cotton item marked "dry clean only", the fabric is probably subject to severe shrinkage, due to the failure of the manufacturer to preshrink the fabric. though it's also possible that either the dyes that have been used, or some sort of interfacing, are soluble in water, or that the stitching is so poorly done that it will rip out when washed. Try to find a 100% cotton set that is labeled as being machine washable. Or, look for a duvet cover and dye it, to cover a comforter that you will then not need to dye at all. This would save a lot of effort. Alternatively, you can cover any comforter by sewing together two bedsheets of a larger size. It is much easier to dye sheets or a comforter cover than it is to dye a comforter, because they are less bulky and they weigh less. Sheets are much easier to fit into the average washing machine than comforters are.

Please note that the stitching that holds together the seams of any textile you buy will almost certainly be made of polyester, which will not dye. Any cotton item that has been sewn together will have undyeable seams sewn with polyester thread. How much of a problem this is depends on the style of the stitching and on the contrast between the "before" and "after" colors. (See "Dyeing thread in pre-sewn clothing".)

Also note that the weight of whatever you are dyeing determines how much dye powder you will need. (See "How much Procion MX dye should I use?")To dye one pound of cotton fabric to a medium color, you would need about 7.5 grams of Procion MX dye powder, or about one tablespoon. Dyeing anything a very dark color requires more dye, so dyeing a one-pound piece of fabric to a dark brown would require about 15 grams of dye powder, or about two tablespoons. Dyeing an eight-pound comforter to a dark brown would therefore require 120 grams of dye powder, which is a little over four ounces of dye. Be sure to weigh everything that you want to dye, while it is still dry, and from that weight determine how much dye to order.

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Posted: Thursday - September 02, 2010 at 08:33 AM

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How can I dye a polyester comforter set? What fabric would be easier to dye?

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