Bleach, freezer paper and Diecuts

This design has been made with bleach on the front of my black tshirt. I have been busy in my lab/craft room experimenting with bleach, a spray bottle and some freezer paper. Freezer paper will be familiar to you if you have ever done any quilting. It is a very useful paper which can be used to make templates and stencils. It can be ironed on to your fabric to create a temporary screen through which paint, or in this case bleach, can be applied.

You will need....

Freezer paper. Look for your nearest quilting supply shop, or buy it on Amazon.

You will also need a bottle of cheap liquid bleach and a small spray bottle.
I used Tonic Studio Mist it empty sprayers spray Ultra fine x 3 343e

These are a fantastic bit of kit and I have used them before with diluted watercolour paints to make spray effects on my cards.

First, I drew a love heart shape on the matt side of a piece of freezer paper. Then using these Entwining trellis flowers from one of the latest sets from Tonic Studios, I drew around them roughly where I wanted them to fit on the paper. It doesn't really matter if it doesn't look pretty at this stage, there is bound to be a bit of repositioning and rubbing out going on.

Once you are happy with your placement, Cut out the flowers with the dies as you have laid out.

Carefully press the completed template with a medium dry iron onto your tshirt or fabric where you are going to create your effect.

Now...make sure you are wearing old clothes and eye protection - just to be on the safe side. Vinyl gloves wouldn't hurt either !

I mixed up a solution of  roughly 60% bleach to water in one of my spray bottles. I then placed a piece of cardboard inside my tshirt to prevent the bleach from going right through to the back of the tshirt. I masked off all areas I didn't want to bleach....you can use old plastic bags and masking tape for this...

Then I carefully sprayed all over my design with the bleach solution.  I suggest you try this out on scrap fabric first, so that you know how your bleach is going to behave - your fabric may even need a stronger solution.  Now...here is where I was not patient enough...so please....wait until it is totally dry before you remove your freezer paper. My design bled because I was not patient enough, but I think it kind of adds to the hippy look with my t shirt.
I tried this on some denim using the flowers I had cut out and a heart shaped hole , but the bleach solution was not strong enough to make as much of an impact as it did on the tshirt. This might have also been due to the fact it was brand new fabric which I had not pre washed because often new fabric comes treated in some way which makes it less accepting of paints and dyes, so perhaps this influenced the bleach treatment too.

So, now you are armed with this idea, why not give it a try. You can use the freezer paper with spray fabric paint as well. It is a fun and easy way to jazz up a tshirt. You can check out this past post where I have used spray fabric paint with Tonic dies.

I hope I inspired you to try something different today.