Round Trip Goods ~ Design & Dye Lab Blog

STAGE 1 : meet the babies

Mid-May 2024

I started many dye plants from seed this year and have been working hard to clear the invasive grass from my beds so I can plant my dye plants. I will be using most of these plants to dye cotton fabric, and to make ink for drawing and painting. Some of these plants are native to America, while others are european. 

Plants I started from seed:

Madder (the roots can be dug up and dyed with, after a few years)

Scabiosa (black pin-cushion)

Safflower (makes pink or orange dye)

Marigolds (classic from mexico, so fun and beautiful)

Black Hollyhock (might take a year or two)

indigo (japanese variety)

weld (bright yellowy green)

woad (native UK blue dye plant, not at potent at indigo)

Clay Resist

This spring I tried my first attempt at achieving black cotton with natural dyes. Coaxing the fabric to absorb layer after layer of colors was a very fun experiment and is just the beginning of a journey into richer, darker hues. 

In the first picture I have the same fabric, undergoing the same dye process, with the darker cotton simply soaked in the dye bath longer by 2 or 3 weeks. I found an article on botanicalcolors.com that gives a detailed recipe for a European black dye that includes iron, tannin, and logwood. 

There is a shimmering quality to the fabric that is very beautiful and gives off the luster of a silk cloth. The second image above includes a swatch of chemical or artificial black dyed fabric, really showing off the purple hues of the logwood dye next to it. 

The next steps that the darker fabric will undergo is a bath of madder root, followed by weld. Layering pigment upon pigment to achieve a darker hue is the traditional method of achieving blacks, as natural blacks, (and perhaps all black pigments?) have hints of their cool and warm hued origins. 

I build 4 clothing racks in November of last year to use at markets and pop ups. I needed something flat pack, classy looking, and modular, something to work in many situations, while able to fold up and fit in my car. 

I spent a lot of time on a prototype, then built 3 more once nailing down the design. These racks are very light weight and collapse easily, taking up almost no room when not in use. At first I wanted the design to have 4 legs, but I could never get it to not wobble. The tripod came to me as a happy accident and so far is working great. 

I bought planks that were the thickness I wanted so all i needed to do was make strips of equal thickness to create square legs.  I build them with wormy maple wood, one of my favorites to work with. The worms that lived in the wood leave holes and marbled grain.

I chose copper for the racks to add a contrasting material, and the dimensions of the rack is based on the copper available, eliminating any waste.  I finished the wood with a non toxic tung oil after sanding. 

There are 2 adjustment points in the back leg of the tripod design. These are possible because the middle leg and the rail below slide along the copper and meet with a through bolt at different places. The wider stance allows for a more stable set up intended for uneven flooring or windy environments. The slimmer position takes up less room and is perfect for flat floors and indoor markets. 

Three shades of Madder + Tannin

I recently made a batch of ‘Enchantment’ shirts and tried something new. Usually the process is... print on dry, scoured fabric, dry, dung bath (not real dung), tannin bath, wash, mordant, dye with madder. This is the process of the reddest shirt in this image. I realized however that tannin is itself a mordant so I wanted to try skipping the 2nd mordant bath and go from washing to dyeing in madder in hopes to simplify the process a bit. I prepped a cauldron of madder root and added a piece of printed clothing but it was not dyeing the piece red. It was a very faded lavender hue. I waited about 30 minutes then decided to add CHALK, which can bring out reds, and what I got was the deep and mild purples of the last image and the ink even darker in the iron print. It shifted the color away from red but helped with color saturation and created a lot of variation and organic patterns. I had 1 more shirt I wanted to dye so after about 45 minutes I pulled out the sweater, added CITRIC ACID to shift the pH, hopefully towards red and was able to achieve the color in the middle shirt, a magenta-ish red/purple. Do you have a favorite of the three? Next batch of items, I am going to try starting with citric acid and no chalk, so see if I can get redder, or even orange hues without a 2nd mordant. 

Fresh Leaf Indigo Dyeing

This spring I planted Persicaria tinctoria indigo seeds from Blue Light Junction farm in the easement garden beds of our yard here in Denver. The first week of August, I researched the process, found a thrifted silk shirt to dye, and began what is often called the Salt process! I didn’t have a ton of plants, but just enough I thought, for dyeing one item.

It is a pretty straight forward process and while there are many variations, the following is the overview of how I dyed with the fresh leaves. Because there is a lot of scrunching and moving around of the fiber, wool isn’t recommended to use, and cotton doesn't take to the dye very much (without special mordants), so silk is the preferred fiber to use for fresh leaf dyeing. 

I gathered my tools and set up a workspace, then harvested all the leaves I had grown. I washed them in ice cold water, then picked them off their stems. I soaked the stems in water so they could grow roots for replanting. The wet leaves came to 220 grams and I think my shirt weighed about 100 grams. 

I then put these leaves in a big steel bowl with about 2 tsp. salt, my wetted silk shirt, s small scrap of cotton and began kneading the lot of it like a ball of dough. The three pictures inside the bowl are at 5, 10, and 20 minutes. I kneaded for 25 minutes the fibers with the leaves and sure enough the fiber started turning a beautiful turquoise. This color is so unique as you can’t achieve it with dried or powdered indigo pigment. Creating a vat with the dried pigment is the most common form of dyeing with the plant, and is a long process. After kneading for 25 minutes, I gently rinsed the leaves off the shirt and let it hang out of direct light. I washed in gently with soap after another day. When it was done and dry, I immediately saw that it would be perfect for my mother in law, who I am now staying with. She looks amazing in the blue hues and I am so glad to gift something unique to her, with the color from my garden. 

In the second to last image, you can see the color difference from cotton scrap and the silk shirt. There are ways of treating cotton with protein milks (soy and cow) to ‘trick’ the indigo into latching on to the protein within those milks, that are embedded into the fibers. (So much to still learn!)

This was so fun and really a big deal for me as I had seen others growing a dye garden and dyeing with their indigo, and I was unsure if the plant would do ok in my climate (and my city dirt). 

Achiote Pods and Bundle Dyeing on the go

I was so excited to witness all the plant life in Costa Rica that I brought a scoured and mordanted piece of cotton and some string so that I might bundle dye a glorious bandana from the fallen flowers I come across. Let me be clear I had no intention and did not remove any plant matter from any forests, I only collected flowers along roadsides and neighborhoods that had fallen, along with 1 achiote pod from the farm I stayed on, with permission. 

So, during our first week, I gathered bright crimson hibiscus, bougainvillea, and other bold and lovely flowers and kept them in the fridge until I thought I had enough. Well, humidity was real down there, and moving from place to place, this closed up plastic bag just made everything get old and slimy quick. So, I worked with what I had, composted the flowers that turned to brown much, added in the fresh achiote seeds and pod skin, and bundled up my cotton fabric. I didn’t have a great way of steaming this fabric, so I left it in hot water. Many aspects of this experiment were not ideal, but it was a great learning lesson. Flowers need to dry out if they are to be saved (or frozen and not thawed until ready), and proper steaming really helps bring out colors if you are bundle dyeing. 

Dye Garden Flower : Sulphur Cosmos

4XL Fly vibes shirt!

I search Denver’s thrift stores for all size cotton clothes that are in good shape, have a nice weave, not too worn or thin or pilling. I am constantly trying to find more XL, 2XL’s as they go fast at Pop Ups and are not easy to find blank. 

Iron oxide Test

I have been experimenting with inks and printing ever since taking a class last winter on iron oxide and I wanted to test a variation in steps.

Test 2 is the way I learned to print and finish the fabric; Print or paint on dry, scoured, raw cotton. Let dry, dung, tannin, wash, done. 

Test 1 involved dyeing the scoured cotton with tannin BEFORE printing, print on dry tannined cotton, wash, done. I wanted to see if this method both worked and would be easier or less steps. This process however does not include a dung phase, so the iron does not get fully transformed. When you are rinsing the fabric, the iron also bleeds much more around the area where the ink is applied.