Friday, October 21, 2011

Sharpie Tie Dye T-Shirts

I first saw this idea at Girls Camp and have been thinking about trying it for a while now. It is so much easier and less messy than traditional tie dye. It didn't quite turn out exactly how I pictured it, but not bad for a first try.
Materials Needed
  • Colored Sharpie pens (permanent ink pens)
  • Rubbing alcohol (e.g., 70% or 90% isopropyl alcohol)
  • White or light-colored cotton t-shirt
  • Plastic cup (or bowl depending on the size of your graphic)
  • Eye dropper or squeeze bottle
Instructions
Smooth a section of the shirt over your plastic cup. You can secure it with a rubber band if you want.
Dot a Sharpie to form a circle in the center of the area formed by the cup. You are aiming for a dotted ring about 1″ in diameter. You can use more than one color.
Drip rubbing alcohol on the blank center of the circle. After a few drops, you will see the alcohol spread outward from the center of the ring, taking the Sharpie ink with it.
Continue adding drops of alcohol until you are satisfied with the size of the pattern.
Allow a couple of minutes for the alcohol to evaporate before moving on to a clean section of the shirt.
It doesn’t have to be a circle. You can make stars, triangles, squares, lines… be creative!
After your shirt is completely dry (alcohol is flammable, so don’t use heat on a damp shirt), set the colors by tumbling the shirt in a hot clothes dryer for ~15 minutes.You can wear and wash your new shirt like other clothes now.
Credit where credit is due- You can find this at http://blog.sharpie.com/2008/11/sharpie-to-tie-dye-for/