The Process of Wax-Dyeing

蜡染过程

Wax-dyeing originated from ancient "taxie", the principle of which is to make use of the dye-resistant property of beeswax or insect wax by tracing a pattern drawn¹ on a white cloth in melted wax,and when the wax oil congeals², the cloth is soaked into the indigo³ vat⁴ for dyeing. What the cloth is property dyed,the cloth is taken out for drying so that the dye will permeate⁵ into the fibre. Finally the cloth is put into water and boiled until the wax is melted and removed from the cloth. Then the wax-dyed cloth is ready. As the wax is easily broken,the cloth is left with irregular cracks of color in the process of dyeing (commonly called ice cracks), creating a unique decorative⁶ effect. Wax-dyeing falls into two types: mono-colordyeing and double¬dyeing. In some areas,four to five colors are dyed by means of process printing, with the colors natural and diversified⁷.

蜡染起源于古代的“窃”，其原理是通过跟踪绘制白色的布蜡融化的模式，以利用蜂蜡或虫蜡的防染性，而当蜡油凝固时，布浸透到蓝靛染缸里染色。布是属性染色，布被取出进行干燥，以使染料渗透到纤维中。最后布被放入水中，煮沸，直到蜡熔化并从布中除去。然后，布蜡染色准备就绪。因为蜡容易破裂，布被留下颜色的染色（通常称为冰裂纹）过程中不规则，创造独特的装饰效果。蜡印染分为两类：单色染色和多色染色。在一些地区，四至五种颜色同时染色，色彩自然和多样化。