Natural dyeing - part two.

Having, for the sake of peace and harmony between Mr S and myself, stopped using the garden, kitchen and every other available space for my experiments into natural dyeing - I have been encourage by the absolutely gorgeous yarn spun by littlemarchhare's Scent of Coriander Pettine Shawl to try extracting some colour from the coriander that was going to flower in my herb garden.
















I have managed to convince Mr S that coriander isn't really a dye, it is edible so won't taint the pan, that I had no choice but to cut the plant back to stop it bolting and that to throw the coriander on the compost would be a real waste. Plus I have promised to keep the mess to a minimum and not use Alum (he hated the smell), so now all I need is rhubarb leaves which according to the books is a natural mordant - so peace is restored and in return I helped to paint his new shed which of course won me 'brownie points'.






















In fact the experiment was an unmitigated disaster - to the original leaves I added a pot of dried Coriander Leaves from the spice cupboard simmered gently for 45 mins........ this resulted in a light tan coloured liquor. This liquor failed to colour 50grams of Falkland! Apparently I needed to add some soda crystals which I was assured would bring out the bright vibrant greens - nope. I did managed to get a yellow and decided to stop there.


















It seems to me that I am not a natural dyer - in either sense of the word. I don't have the feel or the chemical knowledge to bring out the beautiful colours that are gettable - just looking at my-heart-exposed's shop is enough to convince me of that.


I wait in eager anticipation for the delivery from Wingham Wool of a selection of Landscape Dyes, although I still have the mini starter kit from Pure Tinctoria so no doubt I will give in and try this more controlled way of natural dyeing again some time.....