Fragments...

is an ongoing theme in my work; if you pop the word into the search box top left of the page, you'll get a selection of posts on that theme.  So it's perhaps not surprising that I've come back to it yet again, while thinking about another book.  It might be a reflection of my scattered mind...  Whatever the reason, I found myself collecting scraps of rust dyed silk.  I find them fascinating; in fact, I find rust dyed anything. fascinating, but silk in particular. The combination of lustre and texture is truly seductive. 

I don't have much in the way of scrap, as a couple of my friends will testify...they kindly donated some when I bemoaned the fact last year.  I got rid of lots and lots of it during The Great Purge.  I kept most of the rust dyes, though.  The fabric itself is fascinating (I think we've established that, right?), but it's in the scrap that we get to have the best view, I think, because there's not so much detail to look at.  Here's one of the pieces that started me off raking around in my silk collection.

It's very small indeed.  I'm drawn to the texture but mostly, to the curves.  On a larger scale, this might inspire a piece of work (oh lord, another idea...aaargh...).  I started raking through the rust box because I don't have enough scrap to fill a book, and I don't want to mix in other types of fabric.  I found a piece to fussy cut into smaller segments...which feels like cheating, certainly, but needs must etc.  I chose it, not because it's particularly interesting, but because there are small random spots of dye, which I don't want to feature in anything I make... not sure how that happened, but it would have been a long time ago, so not worth worrying about.

There's certainly enough interesting bits to supply the book, so that's done... but of course, when faced with a box full of fabric, it would be rude not to continue... and look what I found, without really trying...

This wants to be hand stitched, as I have done with a number of rust dyed pieces (check it out here).  The first one I did, I tried machine stitch, but really didn't like it, not enough texture, and have stuck to hand stitch ever since.  There's a short series entitled 'Flotsam and Jetsam', which I posted about here.  I don't think this wants to be part of that, though... it makes me think, not of the beach, but of autumn.  One to contemplate....in any case, it'll need to wait until I can stand long enough to sort out some batting.

This next one, though, I can do something with Right Now.  It wants to be a scarf...

...it's just long enough.  It won't tie, but a small brooch or pin will hold it beautifully.  All I need to do is hand roll the edges, which is about all I've got the energy for at the moment, albeit in small stages, one thread at a time. 

And at that point, I stopped looking.... no point in planning more than I can reasonably do, given my fractured mind tends to throw up more ideas than I can cope with, on a daily basis.  I'd like to do some more rust dyeing, but at present I have more than enough to work with, and, of course, all of my rusty bits were ditched before the move, so I'll have to find some more before I can continue...sigh...  it may be the only type of dyeing I have the energy for.