Dyeing, Printing, & Painting With Botanical Colours

Identifying plants that are effective for colour extraction and application. Learning how to select the right plants for your project.

We will work with a mixture of wild foraged plants, common garden plants, and specialist plants you can grow or buy.

I will share a permaculture approach to starting your dye garden, and a guide to safely and responsibly foraging for dye plants.

We will also cover harvesting, preserving and storing plant material.

Identifying plants for textile dyeing, ink and paint making, crayon making, bundle dyeing, and printmaking.

Selecting the right fabrics and effectively treating the fabrics with mordants (fixatives) is key to success when natural dyeing.

We will cover various mordanting techniques including three approaches to plant based mordanting, as well as mineral mordants for cellulose and protein fibres.

You will get access to colour samples that demonstrate how different mordants react with different fabrics and dyes.

Step by step process for extracting plant dyes and applying them to textiles.

Approaches for extracting plant dyes minimising water and energy use. Different approaches for working with woody and tender plant materials. Working with heat sensitive plants, and waxy plants.

Organic Indigo vat dyeing is a traditional technique using indigo pigment to create shades of blue. Indigo is also useful for over-dyeing reds and yellows to make lightfast purples and greens.

Learn how to make, maintain, dye with, replenish, and dispose of an indigo dye vat.

Shibori, sashiko,and arashi are Japanese resist dyeing techniques where fabric is manipulated before dyeing to create unique patterns. Participants will learn how to fold, bind, or twist fabric to achieve these intricate designs.

Bundle dyeing involves wrapping fabric around plant materials and then steaming the bundle. This process allows for the transfer of natural pigments from the plants to the fabric, resulting in interesting and organic patterns. Learn what fibres, plants, modifiers, and mordants work best for this process.

An introduction to four techniques for making inks and paints, including making lake pigments. Identifying reliable and effective plants for pigment. How to use binders, preservatives, and additives. Working with metals, acids, and alkalis as to fix and transform colours on the paper.

Learn how to make pastes by combining dyes, extracts, modifiers, or mordants with suitable binders reactants, and solvents. Explore techniques for achieving the desired consistency and texture in your pastes. Gain practical insights into application methods, drying, and post-treatment.

We will look at simple approaches to applying print pastes, including silk screen printing, potato printing, and directly applying the pastes with a brush.

How mordants can be utilised in textile printing. Discover the process of applying mordants to fabric surfaces, before dyeing creating vivid and long-lasting prints through chemical bonding with dyes.

Applying plant dye print pastes to textiles. Including drying, fixing, and layering colour.

How to create multiple colour prints with just one dye plant through the application of modifiers on dyed fabric.