Natural Dyeing is fun and experimental. Firstly, it’s a great way to get out and reconnect with your local environment. Scouring the neighbourhood for plant material, asking your neighbour if you can pick their nettles is a real conversation starter! Trips out to any green space will quickly turn into foraging expeditions. As a result, favourite spots may become annual pilgrimages to collect seasonal dye material. Dye plants can be grown nearer to home in the flower border. And if you don’t have access to an outdoor space, then kitchen waste is a good place to start.
Secondly, natural dyeing can be both fascinating and intriguing because of the unlikely colours released from dye plants and the variations in colour given throughout the growing season. Soil type, weather patterns and even the pH of your water will affect the colours achieved. However, I must warn you. It is the unpredictability of the final outcome that can make the process of natural dyeing entirely addictive!
Lastly there’s a whole community of natural dyers out there to share results with. So be you a sewer an artist or crafter, natural dyeing is a social, cheap and earth-friendly way to create or up-cycle unique and beautiful yarn and fabric items.
During this two day workshop for beginners you will learn about the dye plants that can be grown in the garden, found in kitchen waste or foraged locally to produce a range of colours to dye yarn and textiles with.
We will discuss how to grow, harvest and store dye plants. How to scour and mordant your fabric/yarn ,without using heavy metals, ready to receive dye. Before moving on to:
- Collect plant material
- Make dye baths
- Apply modifiers
- Produce colour swatches
- Create a mini swatch book
