How to Upcycle Your Wardrobe with Tie Dye

Prewash the garments without fabric softener, squeeze out any excess water and leave damp.

Scrunch up the damp jeans, t-shirts, socks and/or tote bags. You can make them as loosely or tightly crumpled as you like to create different levels of creases.

Secure some of the crumples with elastic bands, the areas of each garment with elastic bands will escape being dyed and create the patterns.

Wearing rubber gloves, dissolve the dye in 500ml of warm water in a measuring jug, mix in 250g (4tbsp) of salt and stir well.

Pour the mixture into a plastic squeezy bottle to enable easy application of the dye to the garments. Repeat these two steps for the additional colours. Make sure you pick shades of dye that will go well together, either shades of a colour like blue or complimenting colours like pink and yellow.

Take your dye bottles and apply the dye to the crumpled garments, you can apply one dye colour or multiple dye colours – don't worry about the dyes mixing together on the damp fabric, just make sure that they are colours that will blend nicely together. Don't forget to turn your garments over and apply the dye to the back as well!

Leave your dyed garments to sit for a minimum of one hour to allow the dye to seep into the fabric.

Without untying them, rinse your garments in cold water until the water runs clear, then untie them and wash in warm water.

Leave to dry away from direct sunlight, iron carefully when fully dry.