Eco Dyeing at Home

After a successful eco dyeing workshop, my mum and I decided to try it at home.

We both trawled the op-shops and came up with a selection of clothes in cotton and silk, and in white, cream and grey. One was even pink, very pale pink. Lighter coloured fabrics have the best results.

We used the same method as the workshop I attended here.

Something to note is that not all leaves and plants will dye or print. In general for this method, things with stronger scents are better, and firm leaves (like gum leaves). A lot of Australian native plants fall into this category.

First try

We did use some rubber bands and rope instead of string.

Pot boiling gum leaves.

Scattering tea leaves and wrapping gum leaves in. 

Whole thing wrapped around an old chair spring.

Simmering away on the stove. The dye bath is a nice brown colour.

You can see the different colours coming through, about halfway into the boiling process (takes 45 minutes).

One pot was darker than the other.

Rinsing in a cool bath after 45 minutes.

And the unwrapping! The silk just takes up the colours in an amazing way. Look at all the copper brown that came from the tea leaves!

This is the same silk top when it had been washed and dried.

Mum's pale pink top was the best of the bunch by far!

This was my best one. I wrapped it around a horse shoe and the shape came through perfectly!
It was a light cotton top in white, now it's grey, black and brown. You can see a bit on the left as well where the stitching of the pattern took up a darker colour. This often happens with different materials on the same garment.

All in all a good day's dyeing. But we still had clothes leftover that hadn't fit into the two pots. So we did another day!

Second try

We put our mordant pot aside and covered it, leaving all of the extra printing leaves in it to soak as well as a rusty chair springs.

Repeated the wrapping and tea-scattering process.

Our rusty things were a lot stronger this time, after being soaked in the mordant for 2 more days.
The dye pots were black as a result.

And what results we got from it. Those leaves that soaked for an extra two days? Amazing prints!!!

Another lightning storm, on a cotton shirt that is going to a good home 😃

Things to try next for different colours and patterns:

• red onion skins can give a pink colour
• cycad leaves for their fabulous shape
• not wrapping around rusty things so that more of the brown colour comes through
• apparently a dye pot of basil can give a purple colour!