How to dye your clothing with natural ingredients?

When it comes to fashion and nature, it might seem like they can never coexist. Chemicals used for dying the clothing are released into the water what causes problems to the underwater life but also nature. But, what if we told you the fabrics could be dyed naturally?

How is it possible?

Natural dyes used to be very popular in the past when multiple cultures used natural ingredients to dye the fabrics in various colours. You can get a beautiful gold colour from onion skins while you don't need to use any mordant as onion contains tannins which fix the colour. A stunning copper colour can be made out of avocado skin. There are unlimited options, and you can create the colour you desire with the ingredients you can find in your kitchen.

What do you need?

- Natural fabrics - I used hemp fabric which can have many textures like silk, jersey, linen etc.

- Natural ingredients - spices, vegetables, fruits, coffee, herbs etc.

- Mordant.

How to make natural mordant and what is it?

Mordant is a fixator that keeps the colour in the fabric and helps to keep it vibrant longer.

A classic mordant contains chemicals and things that could harm the body, while natural mordant can be made from food.

To make natural mordant you need:

- Salt or,

-Vinegar or,

-Soya milk.

For the experiments, I used 1 part of white vinegar to 3 parts of water. Keep the fabric dipped in the water and vinegar for at least one hour and while is it still soaking wet, dip it in the dye. You can make various mordants with the use of water and salt or water and soya milk.

To make a mordant with salt, you use the same steps as if making mordant with vinegar and water.

Here is the whole step by step tutorial with a red cabbage:

TThe colour lasts on the fabrics a little bit less as the fabric used was polyester. After the research, I realized the natural dye holds the colour better on natural fabric and therefore, for future experiments, hemp fabric was used.

For a beautiful gold colour, only simple and cheap onion skins were used, while turmeric and saffron offered rich, vibrant yellow colour.

Which fabric is the best?

For my experiments, I firstly tried 100 % cotton which held well however, after the research I used hemp fabric which is considered to be the most environmentally friendly fabric in the World. The hemp fabric can be made into various types of fabrics from silk to jersey which offers unlimited options for your designs.

Hemp fabrics in various types.

Hemp fabric dyed with onion skins. I highly recommend charmeuse help silk fabric as it looks

stunning and luxurious.

Fabric dyed with saffron. Dyes instantly after dipping into the colour.

Saffron colour

The experiment is extremely funny and helps you find out the right colour for your designs while not causing any harm to anybody. Try to dye your fabrics with blueberry or another spice!

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