techniques

Rusty Madder etc

May 3, 2012 By Victoria Leave a Comment

Finally got round to dyeing a batch of yarn that has been sitting forlorn and waiting for me to find time, the most rare commodity of all these days. After bouts of the plague hit the family, overseas visitors came etc., etc., I finally got around my pots out and set to work. I have to say I am very happy with the results. I used Madder for the first time and I also used some Pomegranate and Cochineal. This time I added Cream of Tarter to the alum mordant. I read that this softens the wool and can push the cochineal towards a more pink or red.

Here’s the cochineal: a lovely bright pink! As well as the Cream of Tartar, I used a slightly less concentrated dye bath. I used an alpaca lace weight from Pollika (gorgeous and soft), on the left, and a Briggs and Little pure wool 4ply. The Briggs and Little looks textured in the picture and feels quite rough to touch. There is a considerable price difference between these yarns.

The madder and pomegrante produces some lovely shades from brick red, through orange, to yellow.

On the left is another Pollika wool in a worsted weight. The right 3 yarns are the Briggs and Little. The 2 left skeins were dyed with a bath of Madder at about 100% weight of fibre (wof). I added a Tums to the Madder because this pushes it towards a more brick red. I think I made the dye bath a bit to concentrated per wof and maybe could have gone with 60%. I’ll try that next time. The yarn contained particles of dye that I had to rinse forever to get out of the skeins. I will still have to do another rinse. The yellow yarn is pomegranate. And the yarn on the right is pomegranate over-dyed with Madder. The Madder produced a lovely brick red and I love this blend of ‘rusty’ shades.

Here’s the whole batch. I am quite excited about these shades and because I didn’t do anything fancy or tricky, I am confident that I can reproduce them again. I am going to use the Briggs and Little for a felted project, perhaps a small bag or purse. This will be something I can put into a kit. I think striping or colourwork is going to work really well.

Filed Under: Dye, inspiration, Kits, techniques

Spring colours

April 16, 2012 By helen 1 Comment

Logwood chips and the colours of bean, cochineal and brazilwood dyed wool yarn

I’ve had so much fun this weekend in the dye studio.

I’m trying to get just the right shades for my spring beret. To begin with I had another round with Brazilwood, using a range of different yarns. All the reds and pinks here are from the same Brazilwood dye bath, except the very pale pink in the top row, which is from Cochineal.

The blues are made with black bean. What do you think of those three fat skeins on the top row? Those are the ones I’m planning to use for the fair isle beret. But I wanted another strong, contrasting colour to complete the design.

I remembered Victoria’s intense purple results with Logwood and thought that would be go beautifully with my other colours. I made a fairly intense dye bath and went for it with my various types of yarn…I was not disappointed:

The deep purple in the foreground is the final colour for my hat! Now to write up the pattern and test the kit…

I had a lot of dye left after I’d done my intended skeins. I thought I’d play around and make a variegated skein of sock wool by making half of it damp and just dipping one section in the dye. The dye ‘wicks’ naturally up the skein as it dangles in the dye bath, giving a gradual variation from warm honey brown (the original colour of my sock wool achieved with previous hibiscus and onion baths) and the deep purple/brown from the logwood dip. Yummy!

Filed Under: Dye, techniques Tagged With: Brazilwood, dye, logwood

Logwood

March 9, 2012 By Victoria Leave a Comment

As a newbie at natural dye experimentation, I find it exciting that I never quite know what colour I’m going to get. Logwood is the perfect example. Logwood, otherwise known as Haematoxylum campechianum…(yeah, I can’t pronounce that either). It is a flowering tree native to Southern Mexico and the bark has been used for hundreds of years to produce a dye that can range from black to pale lilac. The wood chips are a reddish-brown colour. and when I soaked them overnight…the colour of the dye bath was also a kind of rust. I added Peartree Supersoft merino 4ply and also Pollika organic Merino, 2ply, both mordanted with alum. I left the yarn in the bath at around 80C for an hour. As the yarn soaked up the dye, a lovely deep purple appeared. Interestingly, the dye bath also changed to purple. Maybe the heat had something to do with that. Seemed like there was a lot of dye-bath left so I did another small skein in the same bath to see what colour I would get. This time I got a paler shade of purple.

I rinsed the yarn over and over and stained everything including my hands (wear gloves). I found that some people increase the mordant with Logwood so that the dye will hold a little better. I think this is good advice. I will still give the yarn an extra rinse.

So far I have only done small quantities of yarn in each dye bath and I have not added any alkaline or acid to the baths or mordants to alter the pH of the water (which can greatly effect the colours produced by some dyes, including Logwood). Right now I am curious to see the colours I get with my very own tap water. I am guessing it is quite a soft water…but next time I’ll try adding something else (e.g., bicarbonate of soda or a Tums) and see what I get.

I also tried dyeing with pomegranate. The rind of the pomegranate is used to create a dye and not the berries. I got a pleasant mustard colour which, when overdyed with cochineal, resulted in a rust colour. I read that pomegranate is often used as a mordent and is the yellow that you can add to other dyes to bring out greens and oranges. I’d like to get a green if I can. And of course, my indigo kit is waiting to be tried out. That is my next dyeing project. The colours are not quite true here. The reds are not so coral looking. The left is pomegranate, the middle piece was originally dyed with black bean, then pomegranate, then cochineal. The right skein is pomegranate and cochineal.

I have managed to get quite a few lovely colours from the latest dye batches, with only a little effort. Now to actually make something!

Filed Under: Dye, inspiration, techniques Tagged With: creativity, dye, knitting, Yarn

Scouring, anyone?

February 29, 2012 By helen 1 Comment

Before you start to mordant or dye your yarn, you should scour it. This is basically a detergent wash. As with many dyeing related topics, people seem to have a variety of ways of doing this. Based on the results is looks as though each of them is effective, but you may want to do your own trials, or stick with the technique suggested by your supplier.

Here are three different suggested methods:

Jenny Dean

Jenny is the author of The Craft of Natural Dyeing (1994) and Wild Colour (1999). She suggests scouring yarn by soaking it overnight in a liquid detergent solution made with cool or lukewarm water. Then just gently squeeze out the excess.

Maiwa

This supplier suggests a ratio of 6 gallons (24litres) of hot water per pound of fiber, with add 1 tsp of Orvus Paste soap (which Maiwa also supplies) added. You add yarn, heat gently for about an hour without agitating the yarn too much. Allow the whole lot to cool gradually, then rinse the yarn in warm water.

Maiwa - see artisan supplies

Jackie Crook

Jackie is the author of Natural Dyeing (2007). This book suggests adding a few squirts of washing up liquid to a large bowl of boiling water, and immersing the wool in it. It’s important to get the wool underwater, but again, no agitation. The wool stays in for 15 minutes. Then you rinse it in water the same temperature as the bowl it just came from (so still fairly hot after 15 minutes, but not boiling.)

I have just scoured a batch of wool that I’m about to mordant using Jenny Dean’s method, and I know Victoria is on the case with the orvus paste soap. If you have any of your own experiences you’d like to share with what works best, please leave us a comment!

Filed Under: techniques Tagged With: dyeing, methods, scouring, wool, Yarn

Dyeing with bugs…

February 26, 2012 By Victoria 1 Comment

We recently began dyeing our own yarn; small experimental forays into the world of colour and dye. Helen came up with the idea of using natural, hand dyed yarns (using our own fair hands) and creating simple knitting kits that we could put together and sell. Great idea! So we’ve set about experimenting with various natural dyes inc., onion skin, black beans, hibiscus, turmeric, red cabbage. People have been using natural dyes all over the world since, well, forever. There’s a wealth of information out there and limitless possibilities.

For my first trial at home I used onion skin (we’d previously used this and were happy with the results), turmeric, black beans and hibiscus tea. The process was fun; I had all four burners going in my small kitchen; everywhere was steamed up as the yarn batches did their thing. I noted it all down like a mad scientist in a messy laboratory. However, in the end I was not happy with the colours that I had made. They seemed drab to me and lacking the vibrancy that I wanted. I was disappointed rather than disheartened, but I simply cannot work with something if I don’t love it. So back to the drawing board.

Black bean...drab

There’s a fabulous dye supply place at Granville Island called Maiwa. It occured to me, after conversations with Helen, that I should try some of their dyes; dyes that have been tried and tested around the world for years and years. Maiwa sell a range of natural dyes and so off I went.

First trial: Cochineal. I remember at once at school when someone said; “Do you know what you’re eating?”

Me: “Erm…no?”

Them: “BEETLES!!! EWWWWWW!!!”.

Apparently, they are scale insects (no, I don’t know what that means either). If you’re interested here’s the Wiki link. I still thought, “Ewwwww!” as I poured out a heaped teaspoon of dried beetles into the pestle and mortar, ready to grind into a powder.

What is fascinating is that as you grind them a beautiful dark fuchsia colour instantly appears and that is the dye.

I followed the dye instructions that I picked up from the Maiwa store; also available on their website.

The results were fantastic! I apologise for my pics; my house is quite dark…even on a sunny day (and we haven’t seen any of thse in a while). The first skein came out a beautiful dark fuchsia and the second skein (using the same dye bath) came out a lovely pink.

Cochineal doesn’t mess around. Fabulous! So now to do something with it. Stayed tuned, I am working on a new pattern. Next: Pomegranate, Log-wood, Madder, and Indigo. There are also lots of combinations of over dyeing to try. Looking forward to getting back to the kitchen laboratory. I just have to work around this family and their need to eat; it really gets in the way of my activities!

Filed Under: Dye, techniques Tagged With: bugs, cochineal, colour, dye, natural, scale insects

Now we’re cooking!

January 19, 2012 By helen 5 Comments

It’s well below zero degrees (C) outside here in Canada so spending time indoors is a pretty attractive option. Aside from shovelling snow and having fun with sleds, things have been going on in my kitchen…

Experiments that involve yarn, cabbages and onions. The preliminary results are above! (Onions win, hands down.)

I plan to post more details about how you can do this yourself once I’ve done some further tests with my friend and fellow yarn-addict, Victoria. We are having a lot of fun with this, and with our plans for the yarn once we have dyed it. There’s a lot to learn and many other things to try. We’re also finding out more about our local resources and networks of experienced people.

We are bursting with ideas about how to develop this online Stitches Studio space, too. Can’t wait!

Resources:

I’ve been getting inspiration from Harvesting Color: Making Your Own Natural Dyes, which is really worth a read if you are interested in either the process or the history and environmental practices of natural dyeing in North America.

Filed Under: techniques Tagged With: collaboration, dye, natural, project, wool, Yarn