Freehand Fabric Bleaching

Creating a repeating pattern on fabric with a brush was pretty tasking. I’d done it once on a yard of fabric, but this time around I challenged myself further and created it on 3 yards of fabric.

As a surface pattern designer, one thing I look forward to is seeing people wear my designs as well as seeing the digital versions come to life on fabric.

The motif I chose for this freehand drawing was from my digital pattern, “ I Fly & I Swim” . Which was a product of me imagining flying fishes lol.

PS: The trade fair was a success, people purchased quite a number of my fabrics. T’was a really fun but stressful experience.

PROCESS

I made use of a bleach solution (hypo), a few old brushes and a plastic container. I did the bleaching in an open space due to the smell of the chemicals. It can cause quite the headache sometimes.

Here’s a close up on how the bleach works. What determines how bright the fabric is , is the amount of bleach you put in as well as how you apply it. If I want the black fabric white, I’ll apply the first layer of bleach, wait for it to dry, and then apply again. It’s gets lighter that way.

The look when it got dry, you’ll notice the areas the bleach got to a second time look lighter.

I memorized the particular fish I wanted and drew the outlines all over the fabric. Firstly, I made a grid of some sort to guide how I would position certain number of motifs in proportion to the other.

When this was done, I detailed each fish, before moving on to adding the seaweeds and others.