The few times that I have dabbled with vegetable/natural dyes have had varying degrees of success. I find that mild mannered ingredients like tea seem to get the best results. Tea also erases the possibility of strange odours so in the past i have done many a PG Tip experimentation. I also plan on delving into Tea Pigs range of teabags to see what different palettes can be achieved through tea dyeing.
But the natural dye thing has evolved and thrown up another suggestion which is salt baking garments. Kean Etro got me thinking with his AW08-9 menwear Harvest Style collection that featured techniques such as coffee dyeing, blueberry baking and salt baking…
Looking at the instructions below, it does seem like a chicken or a duck could benefit from salt baking (delish…) but apparently putting some white cotton in gets you some burnt effects that I used to see in the likes of Robert Cary Williams’ clothes…
Still, looking like the least messiest (aka the least likely to fuck up…) out of the three Etro ‘au natural’ techniques means that I’ve got to get me some white cotton dresses, tops and skirts to see what sort of results I yield…
Ingredients: 1 white 100% cotton Etro shirt (or just any other cotton shirt…), 6 kg. coarse cooking salt.
Preparation: Pour coarse cooking salt into an ovenproof baking dish to form a 1 cm. thick layer. Fold the white shirt as you normally do (to put it away in a drawer) and place it on top of the salt layer in the baking dish.
Completely cover the shirt with coarse cooking salt. Bake in the oven at a temperature of 180° C (approx. 350° F) for about 40 minutes. Afterwards, remove the baking dish from the oven. Remove all the salt from the shirt and carefully hang the shirt on a hanger to let it cool.
Et voila…. a burnt sort of effect on the shirt that will supposedly look cool or something to that effect…
oooo I’d love to try that!!!
These techniques look seriously interesting Susie. We tea/coffee dye samples, trims and fabrics here at work quite a lot to get various vintage shades….but I’ve never thought of experiementing with the oven. I may give it a go, and hopefully NOT burn my flat down! Cx
I think it is time for a visit to the local thrift shop for a cheap white cotton shirt.
Ditto to all the above – lol!
the idea’s really cool! but is the bottom part of your post gone?
Oh no – your post has ended mid sentence! Cool techniques though – i love experimenting with nautral dyes.
Ooops…sorry fast posting ppl!
Sounds like fun, though I don’t know what my boyfriend will say when I start cooking clothes in his baking trays (he’s a bit of a chef)!
oh wow! i think tea-bagging has been used a lot for aging in counterfeit old things. it would be cool to do something like age a contemporary gown. or that’s another wierd idea i have…
Oh, how so very random!
I am always afraid of putting strange things in owens , and what if it explodes? haha
But seeing that you already tried, I can try too!
(I will close the door and stay far of the kitchen, just in case) 😀
Oh, neat! I’d love to try this on a twirly skirt — Dharma Trading has a whole bunch of plain white cotton pieces that are ready-to-dye, but most of them are jersey. (Somehow I don’t think it’ll look as good on jersey…) Very cool; thank you for sharing!
I need to start dyeing…
lovely, reminds of raku-fired pottery from paul soldner.
that is SO interesting. i’ve done both tea and coffee dyeing but NEVER thought of using salt! wow! gotta try that on my new collection.
the effect looks fascinating. can’t wait to get home to a kitchen where i can actually try this, not sure how well baking my shirts would go down in student halls!
why would anyone want a shirt that looks burnt?!