I have a number of white muslins, baby grows and nappies that I thought it would b fun to brighten up by dying, but maternity pay being what it is, when I came to buy dye I decided it was an unnecessary waste of money. Then while making my blackcurrant sorbet and appreciating the colour of it, I got to thinking about natural dyes. I did some reading online about different methods of dying, and mordants to use, and then decided to have a go with what I could find in the garden.
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| White items to dye |
My mum had mentioned earlier in the week that she ha a glut of soft fruit if I wanted to pick some so I started there. She wasn't too keen when I told her it was for dying rather than eating though! So I started with the yellow raspberries as she had the most of those.
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| Yellow raspberries waiting to boil |
The raspberries are a lovely orangy yellow, I had about a litre of raspberries which I boiled with two litres of water for a couple of hours before straining. The resultant liquid was more of a peachy orange, but still a nice colour. I had about a litre of dye mix which wasn't enough for all three items, so I jsut did the muslin and the vest.
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| Yellow raspberry dye |
To prepare the fabric for dying I soaked it in a mordant of salt which is recommended for berries. I used 1 cup of salt to 4 cups of water and let it soak for a coup,e of hours. Then rinsed the fabric and left to soak in the yellow raspberry dye over night.
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| Fabric soaking in dye mix |
After soaking overnight the colour wasn't very strong, and after rinsing it was even weaker. I anticipate after drying it will be even lighter!
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| Dyed fabric on a white towel to show colour |
The final colour is a bit of a disappointment. Sort of a creamy ivory, the kind of colour you can get with a quick tea dip.
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| Final rinsed fabric |
In summary, yellow raspberry as a dye is not worth it! If you want to achieve this colour, just use tea. Not a total loss though, the chickens appreciated the left over raspberry seed mush.
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| Chickens enjoying yellow raspberry mush |
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