Helpful hints how to handle and take care of hand dyed threads

Note: colorfastness cannot be guaranteed for hand dyed threads

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Before you wash embroideries, examine them for color fastness: Dip a small piece of the thread you used into cold or lukewarm water. Take a piece of white cotton fabric, put it over the thread and iron with strong pressure. If there is more than a very light shade of color on the white, it is advisable to give dry clean the embroidery. You can even do this test before you start to embroider with the thread. If the thread bleeds easily, you can rinse it several times in cold or tepid water to remove surplus color.

Do not soak, boil or bleach embroideries. Do not try to remove specks yourself. The threads (only pastel and light colors) can be hand or machine-washed in hot water (until 60°C) with a detergent for sensitive laundry or a gentle cleaning agent (pure soap, hair shampoo). Special detergents for silk or wool let the colors bleed more easily.

When you hand wash, rinse the piece at least three times rinse, the water should be hot. Put the embroidery into a clean dry terry-cloth to remove surplus water by rolling the cloth. Take the embroidery out immediately and smoothen it straight. Never leave it in a cloth or in a crumpled condition. Dry it at an airy place, but never in direct sunlight or directly on a source of heat. Iron, if necessary, with a nearly cold iron, as long as the fabric is slightly and evenly damp. Never use a steam iron, the combination of humidity and heat let the threads bleed, never wet any single small spots on the embroidery. Finally iron briefly on the right side.

Note! Pay special attention with dark colors (dark navy, dark brown, red, green or purple) these colors can bleed even if they are industrially dyed. Tumble with a low turn (>= 800 turns/min) and spread it out flatly for drying. If a color should bleed, rinse it immediately in lukewarm water until the bled color is washed out completely.
Further Information: Our threads are mashine-washed at 40° Celsius. They are quite lightfast as long as not exposed to direct sunlight. After washing they are gently dried in a dryer with a special processing which will fix the colours even better and makes them soft and fluffy so they will give any embroidery a very gentle surface.

How to make use of the Tentakulum label
Label

 

Gently pull the two sides of the popular Tentakulum Label apart.

Label

Cut the skein through where the skein is hold together with a knot. This will give you a length of 1m, the ideal length for any thread to be used for embroidery is 50cm. So if you will be using just one ply, cut the thread in half, if you are using an even number of thread fold it in half. In doing this you will also “eliminate” the white spot that most of the times appears where the skein is tied up.
Label
Wrap the cut skein around the middle of the label once.
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Gently re-lock the two sides of the label.
Label

Now you can pull out the number of threads you need at the top of the label, this is best done with the eye of a needle. All threads not needed at the moment stay put in the label and thus you will always know which material and colour it is.
Label