Saturday 22 November 2008

16th/17thC dyes

Today I have been refreshing my collection of naturally dyed yarn, mostly silk today, but a little wool as well. I've been working broadly from some sixteenth and seventeenth century recipes over at http://www.elizabethancostume.net/dyes

So far I've done several skeins of madder, one of madder dipped in cochineal, one of cochineal and one of weld:

Now, I'm on a black dye recipe: 
Black Dye Take 1 part 
copperas, 4 parts ground gallnuts and boil with the wool yarn or 
silk for 2 hours. Take it out and let it cool. Put it back in until it is black enough. Finally rinse clean in fresh water
Marx Ziegler's Weber Kunst und Bild Buch of 1677 tr Patricia Hilts available online at 
http://www.elizabethancostume.net/dyes/zieglerdyebook.html#31 




















































Will report back in two hours as to the final colour

1 comment:

dottyspots said...

Lovely colours. I keep meaning to try and do some dyeing but never quite get around to it. I think when the weather warms up again we might have a session at my friend's house as a group thing (that might motivate me a little more ;0)