Description

RESPONSIBLY SOURCED IMPORTED DYES
Traditional plant and insect dyes, responsibly sourced, either directly from the farmers and growers or through companies with a strong ethical sourcing policy. The majority of these dyes have excellent wash and lightfastness, please see further information below for those that are more fugitive.

Brazilwood Chips – a wide range of pinks with an alum mordant, (soak for a few days for best results, the chips are quite large but we find the vat keeps going for a long time). Good wash fastness, but will fade over time in strong sunlight (better lightfastness than logwood). This is our final stock of Brazilwood, it it came from CITES certified historic stock and we will not be purchasing any more.
Buckthorn berries – golds with an alum mordant, greens with alum and alkali.
Cochineal beetles from the Canary Islands – a wide range of pinks with an alum mordant, shift towards purple with alkali and dark purplish black with iron (these are whole dried beetles so grind/crush with pestle and mortar or similar).
Dyer’s Alkanet – slightly fugitive purples with an alum mordant, greys with iron! Alcohol can be used for a more successful extraction.
Hollyhock flowers – fugitive greens and pinks with alum, no mordant and iron.
Turkish Madder (high quality) – good reds, oranges and pinks with an alum mordant, (this is ground madder but with pieces, so the vat will keep on giving after the initial dyeing).
Logwood Chips- beautiful purples with an alum mordant but these will fade out in sunlight very quickly, much more lightfast blacks with iron or copper mordants.
Safflower – yellows, oranges and pinks (on cotton) red (on silk). This dye was used to make ‘red tape’.
Indigo and Woad – blues and if over-dyed with any yellow a wide range of greens. We currently sell Thiourea dioxide and Sodium hydrosulphite (reducing agents) and Soda ash (alkali) for use in making an Indigo or Woad vat, see Mordants, Assistants and Sundries. If you need detailed instructions on how to make a vat using Indigo or Woad Extract please email us .
We do have some detailed guides to using the mordants and dyestuffs – please email us if you need these or if you have any questions and we will do our best to answer them. Photos of your dye baths / vats / dyed skeins may help us problem solve.

We have a policy of buying no new packaging material for use in posting out parcels, we re-use old packaging gathered from other local businesses, individuals and schools. We hope you will enjoy receiving your parcel, whatever shape and size it is, knowing that it has a little less impact on the environment