We’re halfway through the One Room Challenge, which means it’s a good time for a progress update. This week, I dyed my linen fabric for my upholstered bed, but it was too dark, hence how I discovered the best product to get dingy sheets white again. It’s all a process, you know?
If you’ve been following along on Instagram, then you know all about us dealing with a surprise mouse in the house, plus my linen dying adventure gone wrong, but I think we’ve redeemed this project. Anyways, let’s get into the meat of this post which is all about dying fabric and how to fix it when you mess up, which leads into, how to get perfectly white sheets.
Catch up on my previous updates here:
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How to Dye Natural Fabrics
First off, linen is a wonderful fabric to work with. This is my first time using it, and I’m impressed – not that I’ve worked with many fabrics, but I really like linen. Anyway, the reason I’m dying linen is for the upholstered California king bed I’m building for my primary bedroom renovation. Now, I sourced my fabric accidentally when I found these curtains on a mega sale, but in a totally obnoxious size. Naturally, I thought I’d buy them, cut off the excess, and use that fabric for another project. So, here we are!
Before taking on this project, I did a lot of research to figure out the best dye to use. I looked into Rit Dye, however, they didn’t have the color I was looking for, and for the amount of fabric I was dying, I’d need a lot of bottles. Instead, I found a reactive dye kit, which had great reviews and gave me the ability to mix a fully custom color.
It’s so simple, I couldn’t believe it! I just straight up followed the directions on the label.
Here are the basic directions to dye natural fabrics using fiber reactive dye:
- Start with clean fabric
- Mix your fabric dye (use directions for how much dye to water). I highly recommend testing the color on a scrap piece of your fabric before dying the full piece! See notes below on how I tested the color
- Pre-wet fabric and soak in dye mixture, stir for 15 minutes
- Pre-dissolve soda ash (helps the dye stick to the fabric) into some water, add to dye mixture
- Optional – Pre-dissolve salt into some water, add to dye mixture to increase depth of color
- Stir for 40 minutes
- Rinse fabric well – hot water and some dish soap works well, then wash in the washer
A few notes:
- For testing the color: Once you add the soda ash to the dye mixture, the dye is only active for a certain amount of time (I believe it’s 15 minutes or so). So, to test colors without having to start over every time, I mixed my colors in water, and used another jar to add some of the water along with the soda ash. This allowed me to tweak the color without having to start over each time. Use small strips of your same fabric if available to test the colors before dying the entire piece, and make sure you like the color when dry.
- I used metal tongs to stir/move the fabric around in the water.
- If you are dying a large piece of fabric like I was, a large plastic bin placed in a bathtub works well. I used another container to fill it up, and then I could dump it out right there in the bathtub (because it’s very heavy!).
- When soaking the fabric, make sure there aren’t any creases to avoid uneven coloring / or move them around frequently
- When rinsing, I found it easiest to rinse right there in the bathtub. I used hot water first to do a soak, then drain, use hot water with some dish soap next, and then do a cold rinse (just to know you got most of the leftover water out). Then I carried them to the washer in a bowl to prevent dripping, and ran a rinse cycle, and then a full wash with detergent.
- You won’t know the true color until it dries. Don’t freak out like I did if it looks way darker/saturated when it’s wet.
Of course, me being me, I has tested the colors back in November when I originally planned this project. I thought I knew what dye formula I used, but I remembered incorrectly. My linen ended up a blue toned charcoal rather than the warmer brownish charcoal I was aiming for. The color was actually really pretty, just not quite what I needed for this room. So, on to removing the color, which also brings me to how to get perfectly white sheets.
How to Remove Fiber Reactive Dye and Make Sheets White Again
Phew, okay, that’s a long title, but let me explain… Once I dyed my linen this really pretty bluish-grey, I had to remove the dye. As pretty as that color was, it’s not the color I needed for my room. So, here we are experimenting with removing fiber reactive dye (a.k.a. very colorfast dye).
Why Not Use Bleach?
Bleach is toxic, destroys fabric, and usually ends up blotchy. When used on whites, it generally makes them yellowed – gross! So, I did not even consider using bleach because it was more likely to harm my fabric than help me achieve my goal.
Instead, I looked up what is recommended to remove color from fabric that used fiber reactive dye. What I found was something called sodium hydrosulfite. This is what all of the dye companies recommend and sell. Two problems with that – 1) It requires you to boil the fabric with the product, and with the amount of fabric I have, that was not possible; 2) I would have to order it, which meant waiting even longer, and I wanted something I could use right now.
So I did a little digging, and found this laundry whitening powder. It is specifically NOT safe for colors, which is what I needed since I wanted to remove the color from my fabric. I had used this stuff once before to whiten some sheets that had gotten dingy, and it worked surprisingly well. The reason I thought this would work to remove the dye is because it has an ingredient called sodium hydrosulfate. Now, I have no idea what this is, but it was only one letter different from the product recommended to remove the color by the dye companies, so I figured it would work. That’s logical, right? Ha!
How to Remove a Bad Dye Job and the Secret to Whiten Your Sheets:
- Pre-wet your fabric – this allows it to evenly absorb the solution
- Mix ½ cup of the whitening powder in a container until fully dissolved. Then, mix into your soaking bucket/bin. The powder bubbles up when first mixed, so make sure to leave some room for that!
- Add your fabric into the water and watch the magic happen! This stuff works FAST to remove dye, and it’ll start as soon as your fabric hits the water.
- Let it soak in the solution, stirring periodically for at least 20 minutes. This will remove basically all of the dye added to your fabric. For whitening sheets, if there are some stubborn spots, you can add a little more of the powder and let it soak longer, even overnight.
- Rinse well – I again rinsed twice in hot water, and then I threw my fabric in the washer to run a full wash cycle.
That’s it! I’m pretty confident this stuff will whiten, brighten, and remove almost anything at this point. It’s definitely going to remain a staple in our household! I do have one last tip for those wanting an extra boost to whitening their sheets: use bluing every time you wash your white sheets. This works best if you start with already white sheets and mostly helps to keep them looking white and bright. I started using it this year and it definitely makes a difference!
I’m still working on mixing up the perfect color for my linen upholstered bed, but I’ll share an update once I figure it out! Check out the other room makeovers on the One Room Challenge blog!
