Playing with Tyvek

After seeing some samples on her blog, I mentioned to Jacqueline that I was aiming to have a session with Tyvek. She then threw down the challenge of both of us making some samples using up to six layers of fabric – in just a few hours!. How could I resist this challenge?

I started off by wrapping 0.20mm gauge wire around a metal frame.

I then cut Tyvek that I had previously painted with acrylic paints into strips and wove it through the wire.

A turquoise Fibre in-Form foil was bonded onto organza using a black fusible webbing and machine stitched in a random pattern.
In this close up you can see the wire in places.

The next stage was to distort the Tyvek. I used a heat gun on this piece.


For the next piece I once again cut the Tyvek into strips and wove them. A strip of Glitterati Fusible film had been ironed on to Kunin felt. The Tyvek strips were laid on top and a piece of organza placed over the top of this. Strips of 0.35 gauge wire were laid down and zig zag stitch was used to hold them in place.
I ironed this piece from the back to start with but it didn’t seem to be disintegrating enough for my liking, so I then took the heat gun to the front.


Now to explain the white bits that you see. As I said earlier, I hadn’t really used Tyvek before and didn’t understand exactly how it reacts to the heat gun. The piece I used for the weaving was an old envelope sent from overseas. I had painted the inside of the envelope but didn’t really take too much notice of what was on the outside. Consequently, when I melted the Tyvek the bits that stayed behind – the white bits - are the address and customs labels! DOH!

In the third piece I started off with a base layer of stretchy velvet, Bondaweb, Fibre in-Form foil and organza.

Followed by a layer of Tyvek painted with acrylic paints.
Then another layer of Tyvek, this time painted with Stewart Gill Byzantia paint.
Then finally a layer of organza and viscose ribbon, all held in place with machine stitching.

The heat gun was once again used on this piece.

And finally, some beads made from the same fabric as the third sample. Strips of the fabric were cut, wrapped around a knitting needle and held in place with 0.20 mm gauge wire. They were then zapped with the heat gun and the ends were melted with a soldering iron before being rubbed with Treasure Gold.

Take a look at Jacquelines blog where you will see not only her fabulous samples she has made using Tyvek but some of the other wonderful pieces of work she has created.

Thanks to the challenge it gave me an idea of what I wanted to do with Tyvek. Below are some glimpsings of further samples I made.

I painted the cotton velvet background with Walnut Ink and on top I laid a page from a 1950's Alice in Wonderland book and a piece of Tyvek, both of which had also been painted with Walnut Ink.

I then machine stitched over the top, covered the piece with baking parchment and this time I used the iron on the hottest setting and literally just dabbed it on the top.

The following samples are just cotton velvet and Tyvek.


This sample has a cotton velvet background then a layer of Lutradur, also painted with Walnut Ink, a layer of machine knitted wire then the Tyvek. Machine stitching holds the fabrics in place. The iron was used again to melt the Tyvek.
More on all of these samples later.