It was only a matter of time before my connection with nature and in particular, the woods and trees, ended up on my silk scarves. I have been watching with mixed interest and with a not sure if it’s for me attitude for quite some time. There is a lovely Irish lady not so many miles from me that has made it her business to share her love and extensive knowledge of all things felting, dying and in particular eco dying and printing. I think without her information, tutorials and enthusiasm, I would not have given it much of my time. However… 5 silk scarves later I can absolutely see the draw! Plus I now have an excuse to forage for leaves, ferns, seed heads and more to imprint forever on silk. I think it is rather beautiful that these now spent adornments of the trees and plants are then forever kept and worn for many years to come and that they too will one day biodegrade back into the earth. This is one of the benefits of working with natural materials. Sustainability! Caring for our environment, A true love of the nature that we are an integral part of.
As a textile artist I love to explore new ways of being and doing, however, they usually involve either silk or wool. I have been creating hand dyed silk scarves for more than 20 years, exploring different methods, so it is lovely to find another method that I can connect with on a deeper level.
So what is the meaning of Eco dyeing rather than conventional dyeing? Its all about the chemicals. Instead of buying powdered chemicals, we use natural products like salt, vinegar, rusty water made from soaking rusty metal in water and vinegar, copper bits also soaked and something called the Dirty Pot. This is created by soaking and boiling rusty iron pieces, bits of onion skins and bark in water and vinegar to create a solution. These solutions are called mordants and they help to fix the colours the leaves have naturally occurring. Colours range from greens, reds, browns, greys and almost black so they are beautiful reflections of natures gifts. Patience is required too as bundles of tied up fabrics need to boiled for 2 to maybe 5 hours in the dirty pot to bind the dyes from the vegetation to the fibres. A short soak with washing soda removes some of the darked iron colour from the background and a few rinses and your piece is ready to dry and use. Lemon juice will remove it from your skin too by the way! There are other methods which would have been used in Medieval times but are none too savoury nowadays. While we prefer to use native plants and vegetation, there are some that have been introduced that medieval dyers would have given anything for… yellows from buddleia for example, which only reached our shores in the 18th century. However, as with all foraging, always be mindful of how you leave your mark, how much you take and that you don’t damage the future of a plant, tree etc. Only take what you require. Fallen trees are a great source of printable mater. I have yet to find mushrooms that give colour, lichens too but I know they are out there!
I find that leaves as they change colours during the autumn season give different colours to green ones. Also different mordants will give different background colours as well. So what have I used: Blackberry leaves and dried berries in reds and greens; the darker leaves give stronger colours. Sycamore leaves once turned browns gave orange brown colours. Oak leaves gave almost purple browns. I also tried the red oak but they gave a poor colour, native oaks were better. Hawthorn leaves gave a pale yellow green print. I also soaked and boiled hawthorn berries, leaves and twigs to get a fab dark brown dye which darked more once dipped in the iron mordant. Various ferns and bracken gave wonderful prints in greens and browns. Old man’s beard seed heads gave fab prints along with umbellifer seed heads, meadowsweet seed heads, ivy flowers too.
To tie my bundles I cut up old t-shirts to make cording. I also used the string from silk dyed arashi shibori scarves, they have silk dye residue on them which transferred during the dying process to create fab marks. Man has been dyeing fibres for thousands of years and yet, you will not find two pieces of work the same. How beautiful is that gift from nature. Plus I love the alchemy of it all.
Comments and questions?…
Karima Rebecca Powell Artist 