DIY ombre pleats dress

what you need:

• a white dress
• tie dye in the color of your choice, I used purple
• gloves
• rubber bands
• a bottle with a nozzle
• salt, vinegar (depending on your type of dye)
• something to cover up your working area, like a plastic bag

what you do:

• dampen your fabric and lay it out flat
• I decided to start the pleats underneath that seam under the bosom-area
• I started at the left side of the dress and gathered the fabric in pleats/folds, about 1-2cm high, moving towards the right side
• the bigger the folds, the larger the un-dyed parts will be
• in case you need to see how to gather these pleats, you can see that in my HOW TO tie-dye a fish scales pattern-post; I made a video for this one where I used pretty much the same technique, just in different directions
• I made sure that the pleats reached towards the very bottom of the dress and then sealed them in place with rubber bands, placing them about 3cm apart and wrapping one band twice around the fabric
• how tight you seal the pleats in place also determines how much of the fabric gets dyed
• now you need to mix the dye:

1. I bought a (kind of dark) purple dye but didn't want it to turn out as dark
2. So I put like a teaspoon of dye into the bottle and added salt and vinegar (please check the instructions on the packaging of your dye, they might be different than mine!)
3. then filled up the bottle almost to the top with hot water and shook it really well to dissolve all of the dye

• I used that mixture to cover the entire top of the dress until I reached that first seam
• make sure to dye the dress from both sides!
• I used about half of the dye for that to be sure that I get really good coverage
• then I filled up the bottle with more hot water, again almost to the top, so the dye gets a little lighter
• using this mixture, I dyed about 1/3 of the pleated "bumps" of the dress
• again, I added some more water, to lighten the dye and used the new mixture for about 1/3 of the bumps again
• then I added hot water for one last time and filled the bottle to the very top to get a super light pink-ish color and dyed almost the rest of the dress
• I left the very bottom of the dress white but if you like, you can dye the entire dress
• don't forget to dye the dress from both sides with every new mixture! not only from the front :)
• when I was done dying, I let the whole thing sit for about 30 minutes (again, check the instructions of your dye!)
• after that, I rinsed it under cold water until it ran clear and removed the rubber bands in the process
• if you want to be really sure that the dye won't fade, you can add some more vinegar to the washing machine for the first wash

the products I used:
Marbau EasyColor Tie-Dye, but any other tie-dye should do the job
I also used Jacquard Tie-Dye before and was really happy with it :)