Wednesday, September 20, 2017

Adventures in Natural Dyeing with Plants


Good morning, friends.  I wanted to share my natural dyeing experiments with you.  From the class I took in July, there are the above two pieces dyed with sunflower seeds.  If you look close, you can see where the weed whacker chewed up the shirt on the left side.  I'm thinking I'll patch it with some other pieces of naturally dyed fabric.


And (L to R) coreopsis x 2, North Carolina red clay, and a dog fennel experiment.


The above are pieces I dyed with onion skins we grew.  They were a yellow type onion, with deep rust skins.  There was still so much color left in the skins, I dried them to use again.   All of the photos in this post are of cotton fabrics.  In the links below, there are also silk and wool fabrics, in more vibrant colors.

I continue to gather dye stuffs as I come across them... oak galls, lichen, juniper berries, hickory husks.  Here's a link to one of my earliest experiments, using goldenrod and poke berries, from 2011.  Here's another link with my experiment with marigolds that same year.  As you can see, I've not done a great deal, but what I've ended up with has got me excited to do more experimenting.  Be well, friends.

2 comments:

April said...

I am always fascinated with using natural dyes and enjoyed going back to your older links to see earlier experiments. Just wonderful!

Laurie said...

Thank you, April. I'm having a lot of fun with it!