Using liquid detergent to decorate t-shirt?

Question

I saw a girl with a great hand-decorated dark t-shirt and asked her how it was made. She said she used liquid detergent to remove the color in the design. She placed newspaper between the fabric, and "painted" on the detergent with a q-tip. The color was removed wherever she applied the detergent, and it left a soft edge, but was quite detailed.

Does anyone know the technique and product to use for this?

Answer 1

It's not liquid "detergent," it's any liquid cleaner that contains bleach --like SoftScrub gel, or a dishwasher gel with bleach like Cascade.  Those are just gentler on fabrics and easier to "draw" with than plain or diluted bleach, and they supposedly bleach out whiter than regular bleach too.

This works on colored fabric (natural fabrics are best --cotton, etc.), but also on colored papers.  

The liquid can be drawn with, or painted, or sponged on... or a can be stamp pressed into a puddle or saturated paper towel of it, then stamped into the fabric.

After the liquid dries, wash any fabric items to remove all the dye.

You can also use a Clorox "bleach pen" for precision in doing this kind of thing:

http://www.google.com/search?q=%22bleach...

Here's more info, mostly on just using bleach or bleach pens though:

http://www.google.com/search?q=bleach+de...

P.S. That previous link was a great one for a variety of ways to decorate t-shirts btw!

HTH,

Diane B.

Answer 2

Maybe this link might help you out.

http://home.cfl.rr.com/scoutingseasons/8...