About
I’m a textile artist. I have a textile art diploma, on top of many years (about 10 serious ones, that’s many, right? It’s more than several, I know that much) of playing and experimenting and studying. I am currently attending Big Art School in order to turn the diploma into a degree.
This blog is intended to provide some documentation of the various artistic/creative processes I go through from time to time constantly.
Look, some yarn!
Also, I’m going to do my best to share my thoughts and knowledge of the stuff that I do. Because I’ve found that there are lots of websites and books and things that cover very specific details, but they assume that the person reading them already knows a whole lot, or they go to the other end of the scale and assume you’re a complete newbie and don’t even know what the difference between ‘wool’ and ‘yarn’ is. (I HATE it when grocery stores label nasty acrylic yarn as ‘wool’!). Anyways, I’m going to try to fill in some of the in-between bits.
If you have any burning questions, you can e-mail me at canttalkdyeing AT yahoo DOT ca and I’ll do my best to answer them!
March 3, 2009 at 1:09 pm |
I am a dyer so I get your headline all too well…Very cool site, found it today while looking for something else, as you do, and had to write to you. Have you considered taking classes? Please get back to me at your earliest convenience.
March 3, 2009 at 9:46 pm |
Hi Andrew,
Thank you, I’m glad you like it! Dyeing was a big part of my diploma (though we focused mainly on chemical dyes), plus my mother is also a textile artist and I’ve learned a lot from her. That said, if I have the opportunity/resources to take more classes, I certainly won’t turn them down 🙂
January 1, 2011 at 10:23 pm |
Hello I really love your blog. Very inspiring to see you growing your dying plants. My wife and I grow weld, woad, and safflower in the summers. We also use grow marigold and sunflower for dying. I empathize with your process and the time and love that goes into growing the plants and processing the dyes. You can see our adventures on our blog: http://www.allysonandjeremy.blogspot.com
We use our dye plants mostly as artist pigments…as we primarily are drafts-people. I was wondering if you have any tips in processing your woad. We did what looks like a similar process which we found here: http://www.woad.org.uk/html/extraction.html
We would let the sediment settle and trying to syphon out the waste water. At the end our sediment was super dull and very grey blue. We saved all of the syphoned water in a extra container to be dumped and when we dumped it out the water was bright blue. Anyhow if you have tips on processing the woad and retaining the bright blue that would be awesome. If you have anytips to make stains or inks out of your dyes that would be awesome too. Again I am really glad I found your site. Really inspiring that other people are getting into the roots of pigments and dyes and doing it in an ecologically responsible way.
Good luck with all of your future projects!
Sincerely
Jeremy
January 2, 2011 at 11:28 pm |
Hi Jeremy, thanks for your comments! I haven’t made pigments from woad myself, but Bleu Pastel de Lectoure does – here’s their approximate method: http://www.bleu-de-lectoure.com/site/index.php?option=com_content&task=category§ionid=1&id=8&Itemid=22. Sounds like getting the sediment is only half of the process, then it needs to be washed, and ground, and then somehow made to stay in suspension. You might also want to do a bit of looking into iconography, as far as I know they tend to make their own pigments and paints.
August 23, 2011 at 6:49 am |
I’d be interested to hear how you got on with the Elecampane roots, did you get any blue? I am planning a community dye garden and blue is hard to get if you dont want to struggle with Woad.
August 23, 2011 at 7:37 am |
Actually I never did get around to planting it, I fried the first batch of seedlings on the windowsill, then I read a bit more and found out that it’s an enormous plant and I didn’t have room for it anywhere. It is also used as an herb, though, so I’m tempted to buy some dried root and try that out.