HOW ABOUT HERBS 



Plants To Dye For (or, Natural Plant Dyeing) 



BY MADDY PERRON 



To some, the definition of an 

 herb is any useful plant. For 

 years, creative individuals 

 have studied plants and their varied 

 parts to see what raw materials can 

 be derived from them. Some are used 

 in cooking, medicines, crafts, and 

 even as dyeing agents for fibers and 

 fabrics. 



Using plants for natural dyeing 

 is an ancient craft that dates back to 

 even before people began to spin yam 

 and weave cloth. Plant juices and 

 colored earth were used as a colorant 

 to stain the skin. A blue dye from the 

 woad plant was used by the ancient 

 Picts to frighten the enemy. The North 

 American tribes used plants called 

 puccoons to draw red decorative 

 patterns on their skin. Walnut hulls 

 were used in Europe to darken the skin 

 for traveling into unfriendly territory. 



Most dye plants were discovered 

 thousands of years ago, when people 

 communed with the outdoors, 

 investigating everything in nature. 

 This way many plant uses were 

 discovered through trial and error. 

 Wild harvesting for nourishment, 

 medicines, weaving and dyeing, was 

 away of life. 



Through tradition, certain colors 

 ended up being cultural symbols of 

 religion and class status. The garbs of 

 kings and priests were dyed with the 

 choice, rare colors such as blue and 

 purple that were costly and difficult 

 to obtain. Through tradition, colors 

 have continued to symbolize events 

 such as red and green for Christmas, 

 orange and black for Halloween, pink 

 for baby girls and blue for boys. 



Dyeing was a skilled craft among 



the ancient Phoenicians, Greeks 

 and Romans. In the Middle Ages, 

 professional guilds were started in 

 the textile business. There was much 

 rivalry between guilds and some 

 dyers tried to steal trade secrets. In 

 colonial U.S. the dyer's trade was 

 again perfonned by trained craftsmen, 

 having learned their skill in European 

 dye shops. By the 19* century, 

 synthetic dyes came into use and 

 commercial dye workshops used large 

 vats to handle long bolts of fabric. 

 There were still pioneer women who 

 dyed their own homespun yardage, 

 but those who could afford to would 

 purchase finished fabric. Few people 

 in this day and age attempt to dye 

 their own fiber or fabric. 



I had the fortunate opportunity 

 to interview a woman here in New 

 Boston who had years of experience 

 at natural dyeing. Cheryl came to my 

 house well equipped with samples of 

 wool, some of which she had actually 

 spun herself She had cards with pieces 

 of yam tied to the edges in many 

 colors and shades with notations on 

 how each color was obtained. Cheryl 

 once worked at a fann museum in 

 Michigan where she gave instruction 

 on natural dying. Plants were wild 

 harvested and heated up to extract the 

 desired colors. Dressed in period garb, 

 she worked over a campfire, dipping 

 wool into a cauldron of prepared dye 

 and explaining the details of plant 

 dyeing. When dyeing, a mordant ( 

 mord meaning to bite ) is added to the 

 dye bath to help penetrate or "bite" into 

 the fiber. The most popular mordant is 

 a combination of alum and cream of 

 tartar. Many mordants are metallic in 



nature such as copper, tin, iron, and 

 chrome. Vinegar can heighten the 

 color, especially reds. Ammonia has 

 the ability to draw the color out of the 

 plant materials, especially grasses and 

 lichen. Different mordants used with 

 the same plant material can obtain 

 a different shade of the same color, 

 even in some cases, a totally different 

 color. 



Wild crafted materials used in 

 dyeing include herbs, flowers, grasses, 

 lichen, berries, bark and even insects. 

 Shades of red can be obtained from 

 sumac, mountain cranberry, pokeweed 

 berries, madder, blackberries, lichen 

 and cochineal (insects). Yellows 

 and golds are available in cosmos, 

 coneflower, yarrow, coreopsis, 

 onionskins, and rhododendron 

 leaves. Carrot tops as well as evemia 

 (a lichen ) with copper sulfate as a 

 mordant produce a nice green dye. 

 Blues are the most difficult colors to 

 obtain with woad and indigo being the 

 main sources. 



I was amazed at all the different 

 shades of yellow, gold, green and mst 

 as well as all the variations due to 

 diflFerent mordants. Mother Nature has 

 provided us with quite an extensive 

 palette of colors. 



My chat with Cheryl tumed 

 out to be very infomiative. I even 

 finagled an invite to her next dyeing 

 party, where her spinner and weaver 

 friends experiment with different 

 plant materials. Her enthusiasm was 

 contagious and I'm anxious to meet 

 some of her friends. After all, they are 

 a dyeing breed. 



Maddy Perron is a Master Gardener with a 

 special interest in herbs. 



WINTER 2005 



25 



