iron100 from chemicalstore.com

to order this exact iron?  No.  I chose it because it sounded like it might work and it did!  I wanted something small and smooth so it would not rip up my thermofax screens. I do not know if the high purity or oxygen reduced matters, but probably not.  They also have superfine and ultrapure.  Since the iron100 worked, I didn’t try those more expensive options.  I can tell you not to use anything oxygenated because it has already bonded with oxygen and it won’t rust.  You also do not want anything coarse, like shavings, that could rip your thermofax screens.  They may give an interesting resulting texture if used for a sprinkle technique.  The can in the photo is 5 lbs.  It is a lot of iron powder, but not nearly as much as it sounds!  Iron is heavy.  The 5lbs comes in a quart can and I suspect the 1 lb would be about a pint or half pint can which is the size of a small can of wood stain.  Enough powder to get a whole lot of thermofax screen prints but a pretty small package.  I believe the square dish in the photo is 3″x3″ to give you some scale.

Happy rusting!

I have been working on surface design with rust for a few years, but have stepped up my interest over the last year.  I was wanting to come up with ways to mimic specific patterns and hit a road block.  I took photos of rusty grain bins, signage, and other grange equipment and wanted some companion fabrics. 

So, I made thermofax screens from the photos.

I used iron in print paste and thermofax screens and I was off getting great companion fabrics! 

I am working with resists and iron powder now and also getting wonderful results.  I am also working on a huge piece of fabric using our fire pit cover to rust since it has wonderful patterning.  More on this piece later.  As the rusting is just the first layer of surface design.

I am so proud to say that I have had some pieces printed in both magazines through their reader challenges and swaps.  After many trials and tribulations I came up with a technique to print with rust using thermofax screens and it is now published!  I hope you will check out the magazine.  It is out for subscribers now, but will hit newsstands for the Oct/Nov 2013 issue.  I hope to have another rusting article printed.  You can see the quilt, Wrangled Rust, that I made for the article here.

Quilting Arts has expanded and pushed me to try so many new things.  I enjoy doing their reader challenges because they are small pieces that you can experiment with new techniques.  Their challenges have led me to many things I would not have pushed myself to try under normal circumstances.  Thank you Quilting Arts and Cloth Paper Scissors!

The large tree in the foreground is a dark maroon leather applique.  I have been enjoying using leather in my quilts over the last year and do not feel I have finished exploring its use in quilting.

stamped and thermofax screened trees

I used the tree challenge fabric to make a similar hand carved stamp that I used with thickened dyes on hand dyed fabric, the unobstructed tree in the photo to the right. The tree on the left partially covered is a thermofax screen print and is from a photo of a tree I took in Bolzano Vicentino, Italy,  Where I lived for three years.  My sister and her husband came to visit and we decided to take a walk and found a path with a sign about an old church that led back behind houses and into a field where the church was.  The old church is utilized once a year for a communal celebration.  We enjoyed seeing the old church (look for a quilt with photos of the church in the future) and found a tree with the trunk covered in ivy.

The other thermofax screens were made with my photographs as well, one in Italy and one since moving back to the U.S.  I enjoyed using so many different techniques and exploring the use of various methods to overdye and remove color from the commercial fabrics.  You can scroll down to earlier posts as I worked on dyeing the fabrics.