Pink!

March 29, 2016 in Natural Dyes, Textiles

In the pursuit of purples and blue using natural dyes I noticed a plant when I was on holidays on the Mid-North coast with dark purple foliage. The plant is used commonly in that neck of the woods in road side plantings on roundabouts and also in home gardens such as my mother in laws.

Although it is an exotic I thought I'd give it a try and see what colours I can get from it so I collected some leaves as well as a small plant to bring home. I have planted the plant in my garden. ( Hope it survives the frosty Canberra winter, although I doubt it!) I have done some experiments with the leaves; here are the results.

Boiled with Alum

The first method I tried with this plant was boiling. The yarns were pre-mordanted with Alum. It started off promising but furious boiling seemed to strip out the pink tones and I was left with a dirty orange colour.

Perhaps more steeping and less furious boiling is the way to go.

Promising start to boiling... the colour changed considerably the longer it boiled.

Final colour after boiling for about 30 minutes.

Solar Dyed with Vinegar

In the height of the Australian summer on days of 35 degrees or more it did not take long to see results from the solar dyeing. I was amazed at the result! Such a vibrant magenta pink after about 3 days in the sun. There still seemed to be pigment in the water when I removed the first skein after 3 days so I put a second skein in and left it for a further 3 days resulting in a paler pink colour.

The yarn in the centre is a second dyeing from the solar dyeing jar.

There are more experiments I'd like to try with these leaves, I need to wait till they grow a bit though! I am still hoping I can push it to more purple tones but only time and experimentation will tell.

Other creative pursuits.

November 17, 2015 in Natural Dyes, Other Artwork, Textiles

I am a firm believer in a creative practice, by this I mean the pursuit of varied creative endeavours each informing and enhancing the other. In my case alongside my exploration of Botanical painting is my love of textiles, and within that another varied practice ranging through experiments with natural dyes, weaving, embroidery also creating and writing original crochet patterns.

The pattern writing came about as a result of having a young man with requests like " Mummy I want a bobcat to cuddle", I found there was no such pattern available so I set about creating my own. I discovered I loved the process of both the crochet and designing and writing the patterns. I also discovered I was able to sell my designs on http://www.ravelry.com/ and so Pinchyfinger Patterns was born.

http://www.ravelry.com/designers/kristen-okeeffe

In the last month I have had a little break from painting and have been having fun creating and writing new patterns. It has also been a chance to use some of my naturally dyed yarns.

I have published my coin purse pattern and am currently working on my crocheted Lego man pattern. Pictured below are the prototypes. I made the red one first but I felt that the proportions were not quite right, so I made the green and maroon one, widening the body slightly, he is also made with a bigger hook that's why he's bigger. I really wanted the toy to have movable arms and legs like a real Lego toy, getting the legs right has been a challenge. I will make a few more tweaks before publishing the pattern.

Turmeric dying the yarn for Lego man's head and hands.

The Turmeric dyed yarn is the perfect 'Lego' yellow. I will need to dye up some other colours to make the final toy for photographing for the pattern.

Varigated yarn

August 21, 2015 in Natural Dyes, Research, Textiles

I had my first go at producing variegated yarns with natural dyes. I have done it before with chemical dyes using a technique of painting straight onto the yarns, however this technique does not really work for most of the natural dyes as they take time to be absorbed by the yarn. Where there is a will there's a way and here is what I came up with for my first attempt.

I tried two different techniques, the first technique is more calculated, I will call it the dip dye method. It is achieved by sectioning off areas of the skein, dyeing and over dyeing, the second technique is entirely random.

Dip Dye Method

In this method I used three different dyestuffs, Turmeric, Indigo and Cochineal. The indigo over dyes the Turmeric turning it green and the cochineal over the indigo makes purple. There are areas of cross over so you may get a little blue coming through but I quite like that.

To simmer only part of the skeins I used a stick across the top of my boiler and bulldog clips to hold the yarn tied to the stick so that the right amount of my skein was entering the dye-bath.

The Random Method

My random yarns were achieved by twisting up the skeins, dyeing them, then twisting them in the opposite direction and over-dyeing, then a final dye with then skein untwisted. This process gives a dappled effect, and you never quite know what your going to get.