Mixing Natural Dyes

Lately I’ve been playing around with mixing the dyes I already have to produce different colors.

I added the last of my log wood mix to the turmeric mixture and it produced a great dark mustard color (as seen on the vest on the left), and the bottom portion was dipped into an acorn mixture. The sweater in the middle and the tank on the right were originally dyed with madder root. I re-dyed them with acorn.

Love these scarves. Left: dyed with turmeric/logwood mix. Middle:dyed with acorns. Right: dyed with madder root/log wood mix.

The vest was originally dyed with madder root then re-dyed with acorn. The sweater was re-dyed with turmeric/log wood.

Another fun part with natural dyeing is seeing how the different fibers take the colors. Above the items were made with cotton yarn. On the items below, I used 100% Virgin Wool. A lot of tutorials I read recommend you use animal fibers but as you can see above, cotton works just as great.

I used different mixes for mordants (to help hold the color). For some I mixed the fibers in pure vinegar, vinegar/copper/rust mix, and for others I didn’t use a mordant.

You can see these creations (as well as others) on my Facebook Page.