Monday, August 11, 2008

I could hardly wait


Hideously colourful, just what I wanted...I have planned for this day for awhile, ordering extracts of dyes, as I am very much for the easy route, life being so short and all, and then researching, and then finally multidyeing with natural dyes, thanks to several folks out there in internet land...so generous everyone has been with their data...having been a vat rainbow dyer for at least 24 years, the folks expected multi colored dyeing from me...I, was getting a little bored with it, with the acid dyes, and voila, back to the future, with natural dyeing, revisited again from the late sixties...and then multi colored skein and roving dyeing which is so not!!! boring it was like a whole new adventure in fibre land, and of course loaded with sideroads, which Iplan to explore in ad nausea...to some but oh so fun to me...so here are the yarns of the day....the olive green kid mohair and silk boucle, you;'ll have to believe me on the color as it didn't photograph well, green being so rare a color for me in natural dyeing that it was like taking a picture of a miracle...lol

I started with the premordanted alum, and cream of...and then put them in osage bath, then removed them after thirty minutes and added a solution of hot water and half tsp. of iron, ferrous something, and then the olive colors came out...I am thrilled, it is sort of a golden olive but at least I have some greens happening without overdyeing in indigo and woad...just don;'t want to do an indigo bath right now...so I am thrilled with the color, and it would look so elegant with soft mauves and deep purples...I do love color.


the multi skeins were a lesson in patience, which all natural dyeing is for me, and so I waiting overnight before unwrapping and rinsing...some needed almost no rinsing , the logwood purple needed a lot...but I do like the colors, the multi color one with cochineal, logwood purple, and fustic is my favourite, but the silks are wonderful in thesun....so this was a safe experimental journey, but I can see so many roads to travel into this realm, mixing my own extracts more, although I did mix some fustic and brazilwood together, which are the orange tones....oh for retirement and a big lottery win, I would so be dyeing full time...





1 comment:

Anonymous said...

turned out great!!! And the olive green is to dye for...
Frenchette