Dyeing Yarn with Botanicals 101
Why? It helps the fibre to absorb dye evenly
How? Fill a big pot or bucket with warm water and soak yarn for at least an hour, I usually do this overnight because it doesnt need supervision and it's one less thing to do on dye day.
When it's done GENTLY squeeze out excess water and I usually leave it hanging over a bucket while I get everything else sorted.
Why? Fixes the dye so it doesn't all rinse out and helps w colour absorption
What? I use alum (aluminium sulfate), it's the gentlest, most environmentally and especially water disposal safe mordant I can find. It's used also in canning and water purification. I keep a separate pot for dyeing so there's no worries about anything getting into food, but I do dye in my kitchen and alum's only real risk is that it's a light skin irritant if I like... dunk my hand in the bag of it.
How? Depending on fibre content people recommend you usually use 8-12% Weight of Fibre alum powder dissolved in water. I use 10% for my merino and alpaca dyeing and that seems good for Icelandic too, also it's just easier for maths. So if I'm dyeing 300g yarn in one pot, I use 30g alum dissolved into enough water to cover them. Heat it but don't boil it and leave for an hour.
Take out, lightly rinse and v gently squeeze excess out.
What it is depends on what you want. I use mostly dried hibiscus flowers, rose petals, marigold flowers etc. This part you can have going on in the background while you do the other steps too. But you can dye with avocado pits, some roots (madder being the most famous), and the bark of most flowering trees
How? Basically you want to take your flowers and simmer them in hot water until you get the desired colour. Your dyebath will always be darker than the colour your yarn absorbs so I tend to go for a very dark colour before I take the flowers out. Strain it and you can just keep that aside for as long as you need.
Take your dyebath and put it into your dye safe pot. Heat it till it's warm but not even simmering. Add your yarn making sure there's space for it to move about a little and it's not all clumped up so the colour can get in. Keep on heat for an hour. Turn off heat and let it sit for maybe another hour, or as long as you like. Longer sitting gives deeper colour usually.
Rinse well! This part you can end up with way lighter colour than you expected because yarn won't hold onto everything. Allow to dry. Congrats you dyed yarn!
There's so much more to talk about in terms of yarn dyeing; ph levels, altering colours, over dyeing, fibre choice, etc.
But the way I got started was just to... get started! I collected a pile of avocado pits and just went for it, the learning curve is very gentle, and the dyeing community as a whole are some of the most helpful and informative people I've ever met.
I sell my yarns on my Etsy store GorseKnits and I'm here for any questions or yarn experiments!
