Dying sofa covers - dye colour question.

[Rachael of Nex, the Wiccan Rat]

I have a second hand sofa being delivered tomorrow and I think I may want to dye the covers. They are all removable and, as far as I know, cotton. Which is good. If they're not (or the washing instructions won't stand the temperature needed to dye) I'll have to put up with the colour as polyester mixes don't pick up dye well if at all or give a lighter shade - this I know.

I have dyed sofa covers before so I am aware Dylon machine dyes do do the business. What I *don't* know is, however, if I dye dark blue covers brown using brown dye, will the colour result be brown ?

In the past I have dyed cream sofa covers purple (fairly straight forward) and all sorts of things black (black covers most everything as long as the material will pick up the dye).

Any colour experts out there who could tell me if brown dye on dark blue with give brown (obviously a dark brown) or if not, what colour dye to try a test bit of to get dark brown ? I'd prefer brown to black cos my dogs are both mostly blacky brown and the hair will show less on brown I think. ;-)

TIA

Rachael

[Cicero]

=============== It might be best to use Dylon's colour remover (Dygon???) before attempting a colour change. Have you had a look at their web page for advice?

Cic.

[Mary Fisher]

I used dark green Dylon on a light colour poly-cotton which had red and other printed colours on it. It's mostly green now but if you look closely you can see the original pattern, well, parts of it. It's not important in my case because it's in a caravan and only used for short periods. I think that even if the brown which results in your case isn't what you hoped for it will be fine.

Do a test, if you can.

Mary

[Rachael of Nex, the Wiccan Rat]

I have used the dye remover - or neutraliser or whatever they call it - but IME it really ruins the fabric and it gives patchy as hell results. Usually a sort of yellow or green in darker colours ! Not sure I'd trust it on covers that might crinkle or mishape. But I'll have a look on the website to see if there's anything on there that might be relevant with reagrds to colour issues although last time I looked there wasn't (six of months ago).

Rachael

[Rachael of Nex, the Wiccan Rat]

Yes, I have had similar experiences. The pattern sometimes shows but it can look interesting.

It's not important in

I think I will. Surely brown must be one of those colours that turns out ok mostly - don't they say that all colours mixed together will usually make a sort of muddy brown ? Fine by me. :-)

Rachael

[Mary Fisher]

Like Plasticene!

Mary

[chris French]

In message , Mary Fisher writes

Going by my 3 year old daughters 'experiments' you get a murky grey/brown colour.... :-)

[Mary Fisher]

It's not what it used to be ...

Mary

[Owain]

"Rachael of Nex, the Wiccan Rat" wrote | I have dyed sofa covers before so I am aware Dylon machine dyes | do do the business. What I *don't* know is, however, if I dye | dark blue covers brown using brown dye, will the colour result be brown ?

I don't think you can ever get anything lighter than what it already is, so it may be a much darker sludge brown than you expect.

If the covers are cotton they would probably bleach fairly well, at least well enough to then let the brown dye do its job.

Alternatively, if you have loose covers it is often not difficult to disassemble them and use them as templates for making up new ones with a sewing machine.

Owain

[Rachael of Nex, the Wiccan Rat]

No, that much I do know.

so

Big active dogs = no small amount of dirt. Dirt brown colour material is the effect I was after, the darker the better !

This I considered but as I said, IME the dye stripper tends to muck up the fabric. And it really does require a 95 degree cycle to work. I wouldn't want to put anything that I wasn't sure was unshrinkable in at that temp.

T'is if you're of Visual Impairment, as I am. Last time I caught my finger in a sewing machine I vowed not to use one ever again. ;-) My boyfriend used to make curtains and sofa covers some years ago when he was seeing a lady who did that for a living so ... you never know, but I don't have a machine anymore sadly as I have had little use for it, being of the rubbish eyesight brigade in the last few years.

As it goes I took the arm caps off and experiemented with them with dylon machine dye (dark brown) to see if they would dye. I am assuming that I was erronous in thinking they were 100 percent cotton (there was no label to the effect anywhere so I was just guessing) cos the dye coloured them *not a jot*. And I mean not a jot ! I imagine it must be of a polycotton mix maybe, or very heavily Scotch Guarded. I've not had experience with Scotch Guarded things so I am not sure if a wash (which I did before I tried to dye them) gets it off or not and if it doesn't, if that would prevent the dye from taking ? However they did come up a lovely dark navy blue when I washed the lot, almost black, which was not apparent as the true colour when I bought the sofa as it was quite dusty. Itv looked lighter due to the dust, obviously. So I wasn't too disappointed the dye didn't take afterall. Dark navy blue is ok when it comes to not having to be washed every five minutes due to dusty dog marks. With the best will in the world - you can put a throw on the sofa (messy in five minutes cos it moves and stretches IME even if it is pinned) and you can prevent the dogs getting on the sofa itself, but it's hard to stop them leaning on it when they're lying on your feet !

Rachael