natural dyes – I Dyed it My Way

This has been a kind of holy grail for some dyers. Can we paint or print indigo directly onto cloth and make it adhere as a dye rather than a pigment? Until recently it was thought to be somewhere between extremely difficult and impossible.

In my latest studies of contemporary and old-is-new-again techniques, I found descriptions of two methods of direct application of indigo to cellulose fiber textiles. One, an older industrial process, requires more caution and effort in working with caustic chemicals and multiple steps to steaming the final product. The second is simple and non-toxic. This is the one I had to try.

Method 1, found in Joy Boutrup and Catherine Ellis’ book The Art and Science of Natural Dyes, gives recipes and procedural methods for old-fashioned printing with indigo. Their recipe calls for an alkaline print paste containing indigo and lye to be applied to a sugar-coated textile, which is then steamed to reduce the indigo. Read all about it and follow the instructions in the book!

Method 2 can be found in Michel Garcia’s latest Natural Dye Workshop video No. 4: Beyond Mordants, wherein M. Garcia demonstrates a technique inspired by “spherification“, a technique of molecular gastronomy. I am not spilling many beans here because his demonstration is deliberately vague on measurements and quantities, meaning that if we wish to duplicate his process, we will need to do a lot of trial and error experimentation. No problem – this is what I live for!

In this simple and non-toxic method, indigo is mixed with sodium alginate, a common thickener and print paste ingredient, then applied to fabric. Next the fabric is dipped in a solution of calcium chloride, which corrals the alginate in place so it will not bleed out of the desired area on the cloth. In a culinary application this creates a gel membrane around a liquid center of something edible, e.g., fruit juice.

Indigo-alginate paint, calcium chloride, reducing vat.

Lastly the textile goes into a lime/fructose reducing vat, which is the 2-3 part of the 1-2-3 vat (this one has no indigo in it). After a few minutes of immersion, the cloth with the reduced indigo print is brought out into the air to oxidize.

Katazome stencils on persimmon paper from last summer.
Katazome stenciled rice paste resist.
Katazome stencil with rice paste resist.
A freehand turtle design made with rice paste resist, painted over with indigo-alginate mix.

Et voilà! A dark blue print stays in place on the cloth.

Painted and printed designs: freehand turtle resist, stenciled fish and flowers, stenciled dragonflies. These have been immersed in the reducing vat, rinsed, oxidized and dried, but not yet washed.

Now for the trial and error portion of the lesson. In my experiments quite a bit of excess indigo washed out after painting/printing, leaving a light gray-blue print or mark. Not the beautiful blue hue I had hoped for. I will need to try different solution concentrations, amount of time in the various dips, and perhaps different temperatures. So many variables to experiment with!

Lots of indigo washed out. Back to the laboratory!

A year into the pandemic now, in-person meetings, classes and workshops are still canceled or postponed. We are still staying home more than ever, shopping in-store infrequently, ordering take-out food rather than dining in restaurants, working or learning remotely and spending lots of time in front of screens.

This past winter, several opportunities came up to take online courses, join Zoom meetings of like-minded folks and learn by watching videos until my eyes wore out. The weather outside was cold and wet, my studio was cold, so what else could I do? I signed up for Slow Fiber Studios‘ streaming Conversations with Cloth. I enjoyed Season 1 so much, I signed up for Season 2. What a great opportunity to hear and learn from the world’s leading experts on shibori and artful dyeing! There are only two episodes yet to stream, but if you missed the series, you will be able to download the entire program later this year. Check the website and/or get on the mailing list to be kept up to date.

At about the same time, I was perusing the offerings of Maiwa School of Textiles, which always has fascinating workshops, and discovered they were offering online courses, so I signed up for their Journey into Indigo. It’s a detailed set of how-to videos accompanied by Q&A between instructors and students from all over the world. Even experienced dyers will find there is always something more to learn. Another set of online workshops starts next month; mark your calendar if you are interested and try to register early.

My local weaving guild has a wonderful lending library of books and DVDs. Following pandemic protocol rules for checking items out, I am able to “try before I buy”. Just recently I have been reading Liles‘ and Boutrup/Ellis‘ books on natural dyes, as well as watching Michel Garcia’s Natural Dye Workshop No. 4: Beyond Mordants. It is 4 hours of DVD lecture/demos, with many “why didn’t I think of that?” moments, as well as almost more information than you can stand about “green chemistry” and sustainable production methods. Having now tried this one, I am sure I will buy.

Spring has sprung now and soon I want to be outdoors, planting my garden and later up to my elbows in indigo. While many states are starting to open up, giving us hope to resume our normal lives soon, there are undoubtedly going to be restrictions in place for a while longer, so you may want to make note of some online or distance learning opportunities you have yet to take advantage of. Here is a (by no means exhaustive) list of organizations that have traipsed through my email inbox lately. Don’t ever stop learning!