There are two ways our ropes get their color — from thread that has been through a dye process (colored thread) or from painting / dipping part of the rope in the dye before it goes through the wax process.
Colored thread: Thread is available in a rainbow of colors with both light and dark shades and sometimes a colored rope will end up with a little more weight than a plain white rope. Some threads will “bleed” a little into the other colors they are mixed with (see the picture of our lime green rope before / after wax), where some colors will maintain their color and just look like a fleck for a speckled result like the black in our 2-Tone Series ropes. No matter which thread is used, all of the colors turn darker when they go through the wax process (see the picture of our blue rope before / after the wax). When a rope has a stripe in it, the person who spins the rope has set the machine up to keep the thread colors separate while the rope is being spun.
When a new rope is being created, it doesn’t always come out as expected. A person has to be careful not to combine threads that bleed over other colors, or to use too many dark threads. If they get blended wrong, a speckled rope may turn out as a washed out bland color or a combined dark mess. Or a striped rope may bleed onto the white strands creating a strange and unexpected combination.
Painted / Dipped: Some of the ropes in our line have just a spot of color like the black eye on the Piranha and some of our ropes have a lot of crazy colors like our popular kids ropes. These ropes have to be hand painted or dipped after they are spun, and then allowed to dry before they are put in the wax vat. These colors stay in place very well once the protective layer of wax is on them.
