We’ve been doing a lot of dyeing at my house these days and collecting of materials for the dyepot. On most occasions, we enjoy the surprises that plants and metals bring to the cloth when mixed with the dye. We enjoy using what’s on hand, salt and vinegar, the hard water from the sink. We spent some time foraging birch tree parts, bark and twigs, after-winter nuts and their pods, steeping, boiling, dyeing cotton, linen and silk with very unexciting results. Yes we learned a lot, but now it’s time to get serious, surprises aside. I’ve been making a silk dress with a linen overlay pretty much by hand. And I want to know what to expect from my dyeing efforts after all the time spent on this garment. Lots of it has been done by hand with a running stitch. 
So I’ve sourced some mordants from ProChemical and Dye. I’m collecting materials for imprinting and studying up on expected results. I introduced myself to our local flower shop owner, Kathleen of Alice’s Flower Shop. We set up a pick-up day each week and this Friday I received this lovely, yet expiring hydrangea. Thank you, Kathleen. 
We separated the flowers, leaves and stems, 
gathered some dried materials, stalky and grassy, 
found some exciting metal objects with interesting shape and texture, 
mordanted a batch of cloth in soda ash, bundled, dyed and recorded some results. 
This is a turmeric solution that we heated. I used turmeric because the color is rather intense with little effort, a good measure of leaf resist or imprint. But time will tell.
And the dyeing continues…
Ideas in Cloth 
