Organic *ground, **cut or whole Hibiscus flowers 

Cultivated in Egypt.

For a light purple colour on wool and deep pinks to dark greys on Linen & Cotton, using different mordants. 

*Use 50% of dye according to the weight of the dry fabric/fibre you would like to dye when using ground Hibiscus. 

**Use 75-100% of dye according to the weight of the dry fabric/fibre you would like to dye when using cut or whole Hibiscus. 

*** If you like to read about how to dye Linen with hibiscus, follow this link here: Creating Colour from Food by AppleOak FibreWorks

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Basic Recipe: 

This dye will need a mordant, Alum, when dyeing wool. 
10-15% of Alum. 
Mordanted fabric or yarn, 50% - 100% hibiscus dye. 

Add water to the dye and bring to the boil.  Keep on a simmer for 30min.
Strain the liquid through a sieve (cloth if using ground hibiscus) and returning the liquid back to the pot (no more heating required).  
Add your dyestuff and let it soak until your required colour depth is reached, from 1/2 hour to overnight.

LOGWOOD ~ Available Cut or ground and as extract* 

(Bois de Campeche, Campeachy Wood) 

*Collected in the Wild (foraged) in Haiti

Logwood is a natural dye wood from Central America, used for producing blues and purples on wool, black on cotton and wool, and black and violet on silk.  

Logwood is PH sensitive.  

It is called by old dyers one of the Lesser Dyes because the colour was said to lose all its brightness when exposed to the air.

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Basic Recipe: 

65g bark, soaked in water for 2 days.

100g mordanted yarn/fibre (Alum 10g)

Bring pot with dye to simmer For 2h.

Strain through cloth, add yarn/fibre and dye bag to dye bath for 1h.

Rinse.

The logwood chips should be put in a bag and boiled for 20 minutes to 1/2 an hour, just before using or soak overnight, bring to the boil in the morning for 1h, strain and bind into bag.

* When using extract you only need to use 5-10% of the weight of your dry fabric. Logwood is one of the more excessive dyes - a little goes a long way - especially when using extract.

OAK MOSS ~ Dye colour Champange Beige to Brown

*Oak Moss from responsibly harvested forests in Mazedonia.

Champagne is the closest colour I can think of to describe the colour obtained by Oak Moss. You can influence the nuances by adding different mordants, but generally no mordant is necessary.
Oak Moss is also used for Soap making to add texture and scrub to the soap.

From Wikipedia
Evernia prunastri, also known as Oak Moss, is a species of lichen. It can be found in many mountainous temperate forests throughout the Northern Hemisphere, including parts of France, Portugal, Spain, North America, and much of Central Europe. Oak moss grows primarily on the trunk and branches of oak trees, but is also commonly found on the bark of other deciduous trees and conifers such as fir and pine. The thalli of oak moss are short (3–4 cm in length) and bushy, and grow together on bark to form large clumps. Oak moss thallus is flat and strap-like. They are also highly branched, resembling the form of deer antlers. The colour of oak moss ranges from green to a greenish-white when dry, and dark olive-green to yellow-green when wet. The texture of the thalli are rough when dry and rubbery when wet. It is used extensively in modern perfumery. 

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A basic Recipe:

50% oak moss or more
wool/yarn ~ no mordant needed

Simmer moss for 3 hours.
Strain through Cloth.

Add wet wool to the dye pot.

Let it simmer for 1h, cool and leave overnight.

Rinse and dry.

ALKANET ~ Dye Colour: Purple

*Cultivated in India

**The dye colour goes more into a purple blue grey, but it depends on how you extract the dye and what mordants you use.

***Please be aware that you will need to extract the dye with alcohol.

Below is an extract from Wikipedia which describes the colour as red...Time to experiment!

Alkanna tinctoria, the dyer's alkanet or alkanet, is a herb in the borage family. Its main notability is its roots are used as a red dye. The plant is also known as dyers' bugloss, orchanet, Spanish bugloss or Languedoc bugloss. It is native in the Mediterranean region.

Alkanna tinctoria has a bright blue flower. The plant has a dark red root of blackish appearance externally but blue-red inside, with a whitish core. The root produces a fine red colouring material which has been used as a dye in the Mediterranean region since antiquity. The root as a dyestuff is soluble in alcohol, ether, and the oils, but is insoluble in water. It is used to give colour to wines and alcoholic tinctures, to vegetable oils, and to varnishes.

Powdered and mixed with oil, the alkanet root is used as a wood stain. When mixed into an oily environment it imparts a crimson color to the oil, which, when applied to a wood, moves the wood color towards dark-red-brown rosewood, and accentuates the grain of the wood.

Alkanet is traditionally used in Indian food under the name "Ratan Jot", and lends its red colour to some versions of the curry dish Rogan Josh. In Australia alkanet is approved for use as a food colouring, but in the European Union it is not.

It has been used as colorant for lipstick and rouge (cosmetics).

In alkali environments the alkanet dye has a blue/purple color, with the color changing again to crimson on addition of an acid. The colour is red at pH 6.1, purple at 8.8 and blue at pH 10. Hence, it can be used to do alkali-acid litmus tests (but the usual litmus test paper does not use alkanet as the agent and its colour change is closer to pH 7).

The colouring agent in Alkanna tinctoria root has been chemically isolated and named alkannin.

SAFFLOWER DYE ~ lovely soft yellow and red

*Grown and harvested in Iran 

Safflower (Carthamus tinctorius) is a highly branched, herbaceous, thistle-like annual plant. It is commercially cultivated for vegetable oil extracted from the seeds. Plants are 30 to 150 cm (12 to 59 in) tall with globular flower heads having yellow, orange, or red flowers. Each branch will usually have from one to five flower heads containing 15 to 20 seeds per head. Safflower is native to arid environments having seasonal rain. It grows a deep taproot which enables it to thrive in such environments. (wikipedia)

Safflower can give a lovely warm red, but it doesn't dye red on wool. First you have to knead the saffloer in water for a long time, discarding the yellow dye regularly until the water turns red. It is a long process, but worth the effort. It will dye Linen, Cotton and other plant fibres.
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Basic Recipe for yellow

100g dye, soaked in water overnight.
100g mordanted yarn/fibre (Alum 15g)

Bring pot with dye to simmer For 1h. Strain through cloth, add yarn/fibre and dye bag to dye bath for 1h. Rinse.

Madder Dye Cut or ground ~ Dye Colour a variety of reds including orange reds, brick red, blood red and fiery reds.

*Collected in the Wild of Iran

The color depends on a variety of conditions, like the soil the roots where grown, their age, the mineral content of the water used for dyeing, the temperature of the dye pot, and how much madder you use in relation to the fiber. Many dyers suggest mordanting the wool just with alum and not to use cream of tartar as well, but that is your own choice and why not try to experiment a bit? Like with any dyeing, you will need to soak the fiber overnight or for a few hours before adding them to the dye pot for both hot and cold dyeing.You can dye with madder either cold or with heat; some dyers use chalk to get better reds.

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Basic recipe:

(You can adjust the amounts as needed)

100 grams dried madder roots
100 grams mordanted (Alum) fiber (50 grams for darker reds or 300 grams for lighter colors)
7 to 10 liters of water
6 grams calcium carbonate (chalk) if using

Soak the roots in the dye pot over night
Bring o 65 degrees Celsius for one hour
Strain through cloth
Add yarn and dye bag to dye pot
Keep on 65 - 95 degrees Celsius for one hour

**IMPORTANT: The higher the temperature the darker the colour.

Organic Indigo ~ Dye colour Blue

The advantage in dyeing with Indigo is, that no mordant is needed.  The water doesn't need to be heated to more than 40 degrees Celsius and a little goes a long way. We can dye 3-4 kg of Wool using 50g of Indigo. 

There are many ways of dyeing with Indigo. Below you will find the recipe for a yeast vat.  For a straight forward no-waiting-required approach, you can use Hydros as an oxygen remover. Waiting time approx. one hour.

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Basic Recipe ~ FERMENTATION USING YEAST:

For 500gr wool etc. at one time . (amount can be repeated several times using the same bath)

9l water
dye container with lid
separate pot for the water bath to add the container
110gr sugar
50gr dried yeast with out preservatives etc.
30gr bicarbonate of soda
40gr ground Indigo
thermometer

This Method requires the dye bath to be on a constant 40 degrees Celsius and shouldn't exceed 50 degrees Celsius. Ideally put the dye pot in a water bath on a wire rack to ensure even distribution of temperature. 

1. Fill pot with 9l of water and heat to 40 degrees Celsius. 

2. Mix sugar and yeast and add to the water. Leave until dissolved and bubbly. 

3. Dissolve soda in a glass with hot water and add the dye, stir until smooth. Add to yeast mixture. 

4. Close lid and ideally put into a bin bag, you want it as air locked as possible. Leave at steady temperature for 8 hours. 

5. Lift lid and stir carefully until all the foamed Indigo has returned into the dye. Try to stir as little air into it as possible.

6. Close the pot up again and leave for 48 hours until the water is yellow green.

7. The water will show a metallic shimmer on the surface when ready. Carefully stir it back in.

8. Add the damp but not mordanted wool etc. make sure all are under the water add a plate or a metallic disc to press the wool etc. under the surface. Whatever swims at the top will be unevenly dyed.

9. Close it up and leave for 6 -12 hours. 

10. Remove wool etc. and press out back into the dye bath.  

11. Open wool etc. and leave exposed for at least 20min. All should turn blue. 

12. If you prefer a deeper blue add it to the dye bath again and repeat step 9. 

13. Wash twice with a mild soap, then rinse 4-5 times using vinegar in the last bath. 

14. Hang up and air for a few days or weeks. 

You can repeat this dyeing process using the same dye bath several times.

Black Walnut Shells ~ Black walnut is indeed a a wonder tree! Black Walnut is used in many different areas from dye to cosmetics to medicine. It is used to treat parasitic worm infections and certain other infections including diphtheria and syphilis. It is also used for leukemia. Some people use black walnut as a gargle, apply it to the scalp as hair dye, or put it on the skin to treat wounds.

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Basic Recipe:

50% ground or 100% whole Black Walnuts Soaked overnight

mordanted Fibre/Fabric

After you have soaked the Walnuts in cold water overnight bring to 80 degrees Celsius for one hour. 

Strain out the shells/powder  and add mordanted fibre/fabric.

bring to 80 degrees for 1 hour. 
Leave overnight or 12 hours for deeper results. 

 Rinse and dry.

Black Beans or Black Turtle Beans ~ known generally to the cooking world, this bean makes a wonderful food dye. Not necessarily very colourfast, it matures into a beautiful ceramic colour - silver grey with a touch of blue. Because you are only using the soaking water, you can use the beans for cooking afterwards, making it a very 'no waste' food dye.

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Basic Recipe:

100% Dried Black Beans

100g Cream of Tartar

Fibre/Fabric

After you have soaked the beans in cold water overnight - remember we want the soaking liquid so don't drain it away!

Fill a big pot with fresh water
Stir the beans to extract as much colour as possible. 
Take a sieve and drain the liquid into the pot.
Put the beans back into the pot and fill with water again, stir than drain into pot.
add 100g of Cream of tartar to the dyebath.
add the table cloth bring to 80 degrees for 1 hour. 
Leave overnight or 12 hours.

Rinse and dry.

Glossy Buckthorn Bark Organic ~ Dye colour yellow golden, pinks and reds. 

*Collected in the Wild of Bosnia

To achieve reds and pinks, the PH needs to be increased to 10-11 (alkaline).  Keep in mind to always use PH neutral soap with PH sensitive colours. This dye gives a good green when iron is added and was used traditionally to make artist paint.

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Basic Recipe: 

65g bark, soaked in water for 2 days. 
100g mordanted yarn/fibre (Alum 13g)

Bring pot with dye to simmer For 2h.  
Strain through cloth, add yarn/fibre and dye bag to dye bath for 1h.  
Rinse.

Oak Gall - harvested from the wild in Turkey 

Oak Gall, also known as oak apple was and is still used for making ink. We use it as a fibre Mordant, due to its high tannin content. Unlike other tannin, it doesn't stain the fibre.  

Oak Gall is available as whole, cut or ground.

HENNA

This henna can also be used for dyeing yarn and hair, as well as for making tattoos.  Henna will give you browns and oranges.

A little info on Henna from Wikipedia: 

Henna (Arabic: حِنَّاء‎‎) is a dye prepared from the plant Lawsonia inermis, also known as hina, the henna tree, the mignonette tree, and the Egyptian privet, the sole species of the Lawsonia genus.

Henna can also refer to the temporary body art (staining) based on those dyes (see also mehndi). Henna has been used since antiquity to dye skin, hair and fingernails, as well as fabrics including silk, wool and leather. Historically, henna was originally used in Egypt and then the Arabian Peninsula, Indian Subcontinent, parts of Southeast Asia, Carthage, other parts of North Africa and the Horn of Africa. The name is used in other skin and hair dyes, such as black henna and neutral henna, neither of which is derived from the henna plant.

 

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Basic Recipe: 

100g dye, diluted in cold water.
100g yarn/fibre. 

Bring pot with dye to simmer For 1h. 
Strain through cloth, add yarn/fibre and dye bag to dye bath for 1h. 
Rinse.

BIRCH LEAVES DYE ~ Dye Colour yellow and green

A birch is a thin-leaved deciduous hardwood tree of the genus Betula, in the family Betulaceae, which also includes alders, hazels, and hornbeams. It is closely related to the beech-oak family Fagaceae.

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Basic Recipe:

Yarn 125 gr.
Alum (mordant) 15 gr.
Dry birch leaves 250 gr.

Soak the leaves for a day before using.

Boil the soaked leaves for one hour and drain. Add the alum to this solution and simmer the yarn for half to one hour.

*If the yarn is dried without rinsing and then placed in a weak birch ash lye, the colour becomes a reddish yellow.

**You can change the colour to green by adding 5% Iron.

CATECHU DYE ~ Dye Colour Brown and Beige

Catechu, or better known as Cutch, is a powdered dye which results in beautiful brown tones. It can be used for Cotton, silk and wool Fiber.

Cutch contains two dyes, catechu-tannic acid, which is soluble in cold water, and catechin, which needs hot water to dissolve.

*Catechu is apparently very good for eczema.

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Basic Recipe

200gr wool (mordant optional see note below)

20gr of Cutch extract made into paste with boiling water (keep on adding, tends to be sticky)

Add to dye pot (hot water) and simmer; the longer the deeper the colour of the dye.
Add the wool and simmer for 1 hour.
Leave wool out to oxidize before rinsing.

*Several more skeins can be added later for lighter colours. Catechu is difficult to exhaust

**mordant wool with Alum for brighter results, but it will also dye a nice brown without any mordant.

Dried Organic Oak Bark ~ Dye Colour golden beige and Browns

*Organic Oak Bark cultivated in Poland, European production

**Oak Bark is used for plant dyeing Wool and Silk. You can use them as a dye without any need to fix the colour due to the tannin content, you could throw in a few oak galls to bring up the tannin content.

*** Oak bark tends to go darker with a higher PH (8) and lighter beige colours with a lower PH (5)


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Basic recipe:

50% - 100% of Oak Bark
Wool (Mordant not necessary)

Soak the bark overnight
Simmer for 2 hours
Strain through cloth.

Add wool to the dye bath simmer for one hour.
Let it cool and leave in dye bath overnight.

Rinse and dry.

Dried (non-organic) Walnut Shells Ground or Cut ~ Dye Colour golden and dark Browns

*Walnut Shells powdered harvested in the wild of Macedonia 

**Walnut Shells Cut harvest in the wild of Albania

Walnut shells or husks are used for plant dyeing Wool and Silk. Preferably, you would like to use green Walnut shells, the dye colour brown is more radiant, but not everybody has a Walnut tree in the back garden, so try the dried shells instead.

IF you do have a tree handy, do collect the green husks and freeze them. You can use them as a dye without any need to fix the colour due to the tannin content.

If you use the dried husks, I would suggest to use a mordant, too. But do try without it, you might like the result!

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Basic recipe:

100% of Walnut shells
Wool (Mordant not necessary)

Soak the shells overnight
Simmer for 2 hours
Strain through cloth.

Add wool to the dye bath simmer for one hour.
Let it cool and leave in dye bath overnight.

Rinse and dry.

KAMALA DYE ~ Dye Colour Yellow and Green

*Collected from the wild of India

The powdery coating of the seeds of the Kamala Tree (Mallotus philippinensis), also known as the Monkey Face Tree, produces bright yellows and orangesand greens

Also used in Ayuverdic medicine, this Kamala powder is for dyeing purposes only.

***Sunflower yellow (add some washing Soda to dye bath) is the closest I can think of, to describe the colour obtained by Kamala. You can influence the nuances by adding different mordants or over dye with indigo for green.

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Basic recipe:

Mordanted Wool (Alum 10%)
100% Kamala

Add Kamala to dye bath bring to a simmer for one hour
Strain through Cloth
Add wet wool to the dye bath and simmer for one hour with dye bag.

LAC DYE ~ Dye colours violet to red to brown

Lac is a powerful dye and probably mostly know in relation to the Tibetan Monks' Tunic - all dyed with Lac. It doesn't have the brilliance of cochineal red, but a much more mature red, like wine.

*Lac is the scarlet resinous secretion of a number of species of lac insects, of which the most commonly cultivated species is Kerria lacca.


**Cultivation begins when a farmer gets a stick (brood lac) that contains eggs ready to hatch and ties it to the tree to be infested.[1] Thousands of lac insects colonize the branches of the host trees and secrete the resinous pigment. The coated branches of the host trees are cut and harvested as stick lac.

The harvested stick lac is crushed and sieved to remove impurities. The sieved material is then repeatedly washed to remove insect parts and other soluble material. The resulting product is known as seed lac. The prefix seed refers to its pellet shape. Seed lac which still contains 3–5% impurities is processed into shellac by heat treatment or solvent extraction. (Wikipedia)

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Basic recipe:

15% Lac
wool (no mordant needed)

Dissolve lac in warm water and add to dyepot.

Add wool (always wet) to dye pot and bring to a simmer.

leave for one hour.

One bath can dye several skeins of yarn.


Add wool to the dye bath simmer for one hour.
Let it cool and leave in dye bath overnight.

Rinse and dry.

Dried Organic Walnut Shells ~ Dye Colour golden and dark Browns

*harvested in the wild in Croatia

Walnut shells or husks are used for plant dyeing Wool and Silk. Preferably, you would like to use green Walnut shells, the dye colour brown is more radiant, but not everybody has a Walnut tree in the back garden, so try the dried shells instead.

IF you do have a tree handy, do collect the green husks and freeze them. You can use them as a dye without any need to fix the colour due to the tannin content.

If you use the dried husks, I would suggest to use a mordant, too. But do try without it, you might like the result!

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Basic recipe:

100% of Walnut shells
Wool (Mordant not necessary)

Soak the shells overnight
Simmer for 2 hours
Strain through cloth.

Add wool to the dye bath simmer for one hour.
Let it cool and leave in dye bath overnight.

Rinse and dry.

ORGANIC ANNATTO SEEDS ~ Dye Colour Yellow and Orange

Harvested in the Wild of Côte D'Ivoire 

Wool, Silks, Cotton and Linen can be dyed successfully with Annatto Seeds. It gives a radiant yellow orange. If you combine the dye bath with Cochenial you get brilliant reds and rose-red colours.

*The dye is not very light fast and might have to be redyed after a few years. However, combined with Cochenial, it will hold out longer. 

**Use Cream of tartar and Cochenial for orange red colours. Pre dye silks with madder root, then add to an Annatto bath to make a beautiful copper orange. A yolk yellow can be achieved using tartaric acid and Annatto seeds.

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Basic Recipe for yellow:

*You can use this bath again for a yellow orange and a light yellow orange, with every further dip the dye will be less vibrant.
**It is worthwhile soaking the Wool in a vinegar bath for 10 minutes before dyeing.


100gr wool or silk mordanted in 15% Alum and 10% Cream of Tartar for 1 hour.
100g Annatto Seeds

1.Soak 100gr Annatto seed with 10gr Soda in water over night.
2.Blend in a mixer and simmer for 1 hour. Pour mixture through a cloth, tie off the seeds (dye bag) and keep the dye bath.

3.To dye: Add the silk for 20 minutes at 80 degrees.
Simmer wool for one hour without the dye bag.

Add the silk again for another 15min. Wash and rinse.

Organic European Solidago ~ Dye Colour: yellow, orange and green

Our Solidago or Goldenrod in the common tongue, is organically grown and harvested in Europe, Poland.

Solidago, commonly called goldenrod, is a genus of about 100 to 120 species of flowering plants in the aster family, Asteraceae. Most are herbaceous perennial species found in open areas such as meadows, prairies, and savannas. They are mostly native to North America, including Mexico; a few species are native to South America and Eurasia. Some American species have also been introduced into Europe and other parts of the world. (wikipedia)

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Basic Recipe for yellow:

100% Solidago
wool (Alum mordant 10%)

Soak the leaves for a day or overnight before using.
Boil the soaked leaves for one hour and drain.

Simmer yarn for up to one hour. Rinse and dry.

Reseda or Dyer's Weld is a Mediterranean herb and the oldest yellow dye plant in the world. Reseda alongside Madder, Woad and Chamomile produce the very best natural dyes for temperate areas.The famous medieval colours, Saxon green and Lincoln green, were produced by over-dyeing Reseda yellow with Woad blue. Lincoln green was apparently the colour of the clothing of Robin Hood's men.

Reseda is the base of many of our green yarns.

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Basic Recipe:

100% Reseda

7% Soda Ash

Wool (mordanted with 10% Alum)

Soak Reseda in Dye pot with Soda Ash overnight.

Bring to a simmer for 1 hour.

Strain through Cloth, put to the side.

Add wool to the dye pot and simmer gently for 1 hour.

*For a paler yellow add the dye bag to the 2nd bath and add the next lot of     mordanted yarn.

**The same bath can be used up to 3 times.