Lichen Dyeing Yarn in an Ammonia Bath with Ninja Chickens
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- Опубліковано 20 тра 2020
- Thank you for joining me as I walk through the 4 month process of Lichen Dyeing in an Ammonia bath.
*Grab your cuppa, your knitting, and sit for a spell! *
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This is a crafty podcast about knitting, spinning, natural dyeing, and ecoprinting with a bit of homesteading, herbal medicine, and DIY thrown in there now and then.
Music by Epidemic Sound
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I live in Texas, but I visited Scotland last spring. At a Scottish heritage museum in the Highlands, there was a lady by the name of Mary Owen who was demonstrating weaving in a little thatched cottage. She had a spinning wheel there, and I could see that she did the whole process from raw wool so I asked her about dying, which I’m very interested in. She said to use urine in summer with fresh things: leaves, petals, roots, bark, etc., and she did all her dying outdoors over a fire and an iron pot. She said to use only the iron pot without the urine for winter dying with dried things: lichen, roots, bark. She encouraged me to try lots of different things from the landscape, and she gave me some examples of what she uses. For red, she finds field sorrel that tastes lemony, or St. John’s wart.
Purple and blue are difficult, she said. Woad makes blue, but needs alum. I still have not tried these things, but I’m excited to see your video, because I truly am interested in dying my sheep‘s wool. So far I have only used their natural colors for all of the things I’ve made. They are Shetland sheep, and have beautiful natural colors, but I’m very drawn to the natural dying. Thanks again for your wonderful video!
Oh wow! That sounds like an amazing meeting with Mary Owen. Than you for sharing the details with me! I haven't tried using urine again since this experiment, but now I kind of want to try it in an iron pot to see the difference. :-)
Love that you are using your pee! I think that's awesome! I'm just learning about natural dyes and am just a hobby crafter on my weekends thanks for using natural materials.
So cool!! Direct and local sourcing of the ammonia!! I have a little stash of lichen from a lovely weekend in the woods tent camping with my grands, just Grandma and the littles. Can't wait to experiment with them when we can be together again. Thanks for this awesome video
This was so interesting. I learned so much from seeing the complete progress from the beginning to the end result. Thank you !
Thanks so much for sharing this! Such a wealth of information :)
Brilliant thanks. I really enjoy experimenting with plants collected from my walks. I never know what will happen 👍
Very interesting. Thank you for sharing. XX
Funny experiment indeed!!!
Fascinating piece of work - i am so impressed with your tenacity. I'm sure I'm not the only person who hoped you had the lid on tight when you stared to shake the jar.
Haha!!!! I was VERY carful about the lid being on tight!
Thank you. Two things I’ve read: leave the lichen to dry completely before adding to the ammonia and; take the lid off each day to allow fresh oxygen in before shaking. I do like your idea of using pee - more natural and far less flammable than ammonia. I haven’t tried this yet as all the lichen I’ve found tests C negative. Still hunting ☺️
Oooh Wonderful! Thank you! I will try those tips next time!
A worthy, fun experiment and so nice to connect with our ancestors by respecting and using their methods. I have no problem with using pee as it’s nature’s resource which is always best for the environment. This way we can also connect more with our own bodily nature and the natural world. I am growing woad, weld, madder, golden rod and more in my small back garden. I am really looking forward to dying with them. I have used avocados and onion skins so far with lovely results. Thanks for showing us your experiment😀
I agree! And I was very proud of my family for being willing to shake my lichen jar while I was traveling in February. :-)
I love that you're using urine! It's so historical.
That was really interesting. I get quite a lot blown down near me (windy SW Scotland) so might have a good :)
at 1:20 you got Lobaria Pulmonoria, a lichen dye aswell :)
Oh THANK YOU!!!
Yes...here in northern New Brunswick, 🇨🇦...we call it lungwort...it does render a very beautiful color.
So interesting. Thanks for sharing this experiment ❤️ There was no difference between the mordanted skein and the no- mordanted, was there?
Not that I noticed. I thought the color might turn out brighter or deeper with the mordanted one, but nope.
Such a great video! Thanks for sharing your journey. I am excited to try this myself, and perhaps... perhaps... even use my own micturated liquid. Haha. (Your L. pulmonaris/lungwort is comprised of several different kingdoms, taxonomically speaking, like most lichen. Algae, bacteria, fungus. Mother Nature is incredible!) can’t wait to see more of your experiments.
Oh this is fantastic! Thank you so much, Melli!
That was amazing. I have just watched your other video about mordants and I'm already a fan :) I really think you did well deciding to use your urine. It's free and it works, so no need to buy anything else. Congratulations on your experiment.
I have discovered natural dying recently and I am totally in love with it. I'm about to try eucalyptus.
Hope you're doing fine.
Best wishes from Brazil! :)
How did the eucalyptus go? Do you have a tree to harvest from? I've always wanted one, but it doesn't grow well here.
That was defintely interesting and worth trying I think. I wonder if one does 2 extractions side by side with store ammonia and urine? I agree that avocado will make short work of that colour lol. I am right now collecting pips and skins again to dye some white linen for shirts. And still waiting for my Indigo seeds as the virus and lockdown prevented it being couriered to me, but it is winter and will not be planting until August/Sept, so no rush. I just love your experiments as I love my own, one just never knows exactly what will happen with natural dyes, but I must admit I was hoping for a nice pink or coral colour to pop out there
Hehe, Me too! I wanted to be WOWed! But, it was still a lot of fun. A side by side experiment would be interesting, as well as using less yarn to see if I could get more color into less fiber.
Then you get your purple or pink, but it's not very color fast. With copper also a nice blue.
This is still part of the post
You've probably already figured this out but commenting just in case - the "funny looking haven't seen that before" is lungwort, also known as liverwort, named so because of the way it looks. the "flat stuff" is a variety of Parmelia lichen. In Ireland it grows on the rocks and is called "crottle". You correctly identified the Usnea :) You also correctly identified the Staghorn, and the other one is a variety of Vulpina lichen. Good haul! I do lichen dyeing and usually use the standard ammonia ferment, but have also done urine ferment (I also use stale urine for scouring wool fleece before I spin them up). Experimentation and unexpected outcomes are part of the fun of it all :D.
Thank you so much, Rowan! This is fantastic information!!! I appreciate it!
Hi, Maria, this is so cool! I wonder if what you eat or drink has any bearing on the urine compound and therefore affects what color you eventually get.
What an interesting thought! I bet it would, particularly if you eat something that is high in certain minerals. It might alter the final results.
Is the unknown one (seaweed looking) lobaria? It makes a nice brown dye using the boil method.
Oooh! It could be!
me neither, i didn't get any blue or red tone, but i used far less wool, maybe only 20 gr for maybe the double of your amount of lichen, so i got a very nice brownn. - but like yellow, we can find easiers ways to get brown.
with experiments like this I always use a small amount of wool, i can always do a second bath.- if it is worth it. keep on experimenting!
The original recipe did call for much less yarn. I may have gotten a darker pink if I'd just used an ounce or so. But, I'm not always so good with following the rules. :-)
I have about 20g of Lichen, how much ammonia and water do I need to mix for the ammonia dye bath?
Yeah keep trying :) interesting!. Have you ever researched "fulleries" (sp) Roman laundry? Urine used there.
No, I haven't! I will look into those!!
Do you think our diet would affect the urine?
I bet it would! I imagine there would be different levels of vitamins and minerals coming out in the urine that could effect the final result of the dye. Maybe not drastically, but a bit.
Is there a real difference where chemicals come from? Where do they come from from the store? I honestly don't know the origin. Thanks for being so interesting, I just love that so much.
You know, that's a good question. I always assumed it was chemically manufactured in a lab, but where that ammonia gas comes from, I don't know.... maybe it's harvested from compost.
The PH should have been 11-13 at the start. So the urine was not strong enough. That Lichen should have given you Magenta or Purple.
Also Avocado pits are not a stable dye… cheers