Blackberry Dye

Did you know that you can dye fabrics naturally with things like turmeric, acorns, and blackberries?  I have been dying with tea and coffee for a while, but this is my first try with other items.  There are a ton of great resources online,  I found a great list of plants n such all separated into color categories.

This little batch of pinky purple fabrics I dyed with blackberries.  There may be a better way to do it, but I get bored reading lots of instructions, so I just improvised.  

I added to a large pot about one cup of blackberries with about 2 cups of water and 2 Tablespoons of salt 

let it boil for a while 

smooshed up the berries a bit 

added the fabric 

simmered for while

let it sit overnight

rinsed with water and vinegar

let dry

Fabulous!

The fabrics in the photo are (from left to right) cotton, raw silk and linen.

Have you used natural items to dye?

What did you use and how did it turn out?

In The Bedroom

That is not my bedroom.

Our bedroom is not quite so elaborate, more on the utilitarian side of things.

Recently I got it in my head to remedy that. New soft sheets and pillows, a fluffy down comforter with a duvet, a feather bed topper, and maybe even a new mattress...mmmmm

Also I'm making a quilt. I'm not a quilter, measuring and being precise makes my brain feel squeezed, so there will be as little measuring as possible. I found an awesome deal on blue cotton velvet at denverfabrics.com, it wasn't exactly the blue I wanted so I dyed it navy blue along with some soft cotton fabric. They came out just beautiful.

(The photo doesn't really do it justice)

I will combine the navy blue with black and charcoal grey and do lots of embroidery, etc. Then piece it all together. I'm not sure how it will come out in the end but I would like it to have a Gothic/fantasy feel to it. somewhere in between the photo at the top and this

Gothic & Fantasy but light and airy as well....hmmmmm

I'll post my progress.

Dyeing Projects

Rit has made a new color chart system with tons of color recipes to choose from, and I have a pile of things waiting to be dyed.

Most of my clothes are black, when I do buy things with color I prefer jewel/earth tones, but have a hard time finding those colors, so dying is a great option. It's always a bit of a gamble, and sometimes things have to be dyed more than once to get just the right shade, but it's fun to experiment.

Some time I would like to try some natural dyes like onion skins and the like (I have used tea) but for today it will be Rit.

Do you ever dye? What do you use?

I just wish the colors had names and not numbers....maybe I'll name them myself.

Time to go break out the dye tub. I'll let you know how it goes.