Striped Thigh Highs Step-by-Step

I'm doing a costume for a friend of mine so she can join our Disgaea 2 group.

Its a super cute costume, and I'm excited about lots of different parts about it. But, you see those thigh-highs? There's nothing like them on the market. So, I'll be using RIT's spot-dying technique to put those gold stripes on them.

So I'll be working with some white thigh highs, golden-yellow RIT dye, a piece of foamboard, some freezer paper (cause I don't want to stain the foamboard: I'm using it for another project) and a bunch of pins and a roll of blue tape.

So I started laying out a piece of freezer paper on top of the foamboard...

and then taping it to the backside.





Then I pinned the stockings to the top side and taped off the sections I wanted to paint.

Mixed the dye, 1 tsp. to 1/2 cup of hot water. fresh out of the kettle worked well.

Trying to dry the dye.

Applying the color. I used a sponge brush and applied the dye. I ended up completely soaking the fabric, but it didn't bleed through to the other side. Then I hit it with an iron, both to set the color and speed up the drying process.

The next morning I took off the tape.

The tape actually worked very well, the color didn't spread at all.

Then I re-pinned and re-taped everything and started again, this time on side two!

I just used simple sewing pins.

It took a bit more effort than side one, I'm not sure why.

It took forever and a half to dry this time, so I took advantage of my mobile work surface and leaned it up against the heat register in the bathroom.

Worked like a charm.

Then I rinsed them in cold water, washed them by hand in some lukewarm water, and viola!

The color spread a little during the washing, but I expect it will come out in the next wash. Its also not terribly noticeable, so I expect that when the thigh highs are actually on the legs that the spreading will just fade away.

Total cost: $8 + tax for the stocking, $1.47 for the dye, and everything else can be reused. Try it yourself!