I like to learn new things - I have decided to try out some natural dyes with wool that I've spun, or will spin. I have lots of blackberries in my yard so that's one.
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| Indigo, Alum, Cream of Tartar |
And I've also been reading about Western Red Cedar as dye too. So that's the second one I'm trying.
Day one of this experiment involved picking up - Alum - for a Mordant. (read about mordants here, cuz I don't need to rewrite stuff already been done). I bought the mordant at this awesome shop on Granville Island: Maiwa Supply
The basic purpose of a mordant is to make fibers hold colour better - makes natural dyes brighter and not fade in the light.
To get fibers ready for the mordant they need to be soaked for an hour or more in room temp. water.
While I'm waiting for the wool to soak I got started on the Cedar dye.
Day one of this experiment involved picking up - Alum - for a Mordant. (read about mordants here, cuz I don't need to rewrite stuff already been done). I bought the mordant at this awesome shop on Granville Island: Maiwa Supply
The basic purpose of a mordant is to make fibers hold colour better - makes natural dyes brighter and not fade in the light.
While at the shop, I decided to pick up some Indigo dye as well - because -
INDIGO!To get fibers ready for the mordant they need to be soaked for an hour or more in room temp. water.
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| The Western Red Cedar in my backyard |
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| Squirrels peeled this part of the tree |
I have a big, beautiful Western Red Cedar in my back yard.
She's got plenty of bark to spare and she's a lovely tree.
She's got plenty of bark to spare and she's a lovely tree.
I've watched squirrels strip bark off this tree and run up into the high branches. They come back down after awhile and get more, some squirrel has a very cozy home!
I striped some bark and then broke it up into small pieces - and now I'm sneezing, I think I have an allergy.
After breaking it up, I added water and I've left the bark to soak. Most websites I've read say to do this over night. So that's the end of day 1 for Cedar bark dye.
In the meantime... onto mordanting wool...
I followed this website's directions to mordant the wool: Wild Colours Natural Dyes
And I used this website to figure out how to change grams to teaspoons because I don't have a scale: Chymist.com Yah SCIENCE!
This is a really boring process... and there's a vat of cooling water on my deck that smells like a wet sheep.
Tomorrow when I make some dye should be more interesting... while we wait lets watch cedar bark soak in water... about as interesting as watching paint dry...
I striped some bark and then broke it up into small pieces - and now I'm sneezing, I think I have an allergy.
After breaking it up, I added water and I've left the bark to soak. Most websites I've read say to do this over night. So that's the end of day 1 for Cedar bark dye.
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| This tree is huge! |
In the meantime... onto mordanting wool...
I followed this website's directions to mordant the wool: Wild Colours Natural Dyes
And I used this website to figure out how to change grams to teaspoons because I don't have a scale: Chymist.com Yah SCIENCE!
This is a really boring process... and there's a vat of cooling water on my deck that smells like a wet sheep.
Tomorrow when I make some dye should be more interesting... while we wait lets watch cedar bark soak in water... about as interesting as watching paint dry...
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| Cedar Bark soaking in water, wahoo! |
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