Fibers with structural colors are of great interest due to their unique dye-free optical properties and show great potential in the textile industry. However, the preparation of structural color fibers with controllable optical properties in a simple way is still a challenge. In this paper, we prepared structural color fibers by simply drawing bare fibers from colloid suspensions. The obtained fibers displayed brilliant colors due to the assembled photonic crystal structures on the surface. The layer numbers of colloid coatings were tunable by varying the drawing speeds, concentration of colloid suspension, and diameters of core fibers. The optical properties of the obtained structural color fibers varied by layer numbers, viewing angles, and structure defects and were systematically studied both by experimental measurements and by computer simulations. Furthermore, noncrack blue fibers were demonstrated by coating "soft" poly[styrene- co-(butyl acrylate)- co-(acrylic acid)] (P(St-BA-AA)) polymer spheres on PET fibers. The coating was mechanically robust and made the fiber bendable with weaving ability, which means this method has versatile applicability and could be potentially used for green textile dyeing.
Keywords: dip coating; photonic crystal; structural color fiber.