Colored by the Earth

05/20/2020

I may have been quiet, but I have been busy. Dealing with the pandemic, shutdowns and all has been exhausting. The good thing is the hubs being home. He has been a busy bee building my new raised beds. The front part will be our garden, but the back end there will be indigo, amayranth and the far back will be the permanent madder bed. Seeds were started a little late, but they are going strong.
I'll get back onto the blog soon so keep an eye out. A lot of great things being planned.
@ Louisville, Kentucky

02/13/2020

The blog is live!

Curious as to who we are and what we do? Catch our weekly blog, Colored by the Earth. Follow our experiments, new product design and even watch as we build a dye plant garden. http://ow.ly/NKki50yl4D5

02/09/2020

Some indigo playing happened today. Also, my basement is slowing turning into my studio. Some water issues halted any progress late last year, but now that is all fixed. Slowing is the optimum word here. Sorting through old stuff to rid the basement of a ton of clutter.

02/08/2020

The makings of a 55 gallon vat of pure indigo. Ready for all kinds of testing fun!

01/10/2020

Soon I will be offering two types of indigo seeds and indigo kits made with REAL indigo grown and processed regionally. I hope you will share this page and also come follow along over at .

Here at you will be able to watch as I experiment more this year with dyes. I plan to build a studio in my basement, install dye plant beds, and create water capture system. My goal is to reduce the carbon footprint of small batch dyed fabrics and goods.

is where you will be able to buy seeds, kits, dyed fabrics, and learn about workshops.

I hope you will join me on this fun, colorful journey. I will be getting an email list together soon for a newsletter, along with a website for both pages. If you are interested in learning more, shoot me a DM.

-Lynn

09/29/2019

Colors aren't captured extremely well, sorry. Everything has been washed and dried now.
First picture all hemp/cotton (left to right)
1. Dipped yesterday in calendula then added at the end of the tuneric pot today.
2. Madder
3. Turmeric
4. Madder, same fabric same mordant same pot, same time. Little different shade than other one.
5. Calendula
6. Annatto
The second picture shows the various bandanas and napkins. Some to the left were experiments, like hardly picking up the annatto and I quick dipped in tumeric or a light pink dipped in the turmeric. Lighter ones were left to cool and exhaust the dye pot.

09/29/2019

One of today's dye pots and the Indigo plants I pulled up out of the ground and babied for over 24 hours on the trip home from Vermont are blooming.

09/29/2019

Peachy pinks I got from the madder root pot yesterday. It was maybe like 5-10% WOF. These were in the tannin pot before mordanting.
Today I have a fixitive pot and an annatto dye pot going. Later I'll be dyeing with turmeric, I think. Haven't decided totally yet. Possibly osage orange. These will be have an alum mordant that I dried in the dryer.
I do have bandanas left that have tannin and alum that didnt get dyed because I didn't like the calendula color. Those may be tested in the dye pots today.
While dyeing today and yesterday I worked on ways to cut water usage. Instead of rinsing in running water, I had bins that I used. I could have used less water in them, so trying that today. If we could get some rain, I have other experiments I'd like to try, but haven't seen that but once I thi k all of septemeber.

09/28/2019

Acorns from red oak trees used as a tannin. Ground madder root.
Alternate way to dye...I
Tannin, then alum mordant, then dye. You don't have to let the mordant dry but you do rinse between. Each step. And you don't have to dung it.

Probably a bad test with the madder because ei knew I didn't have enough dye with the weight of fabric. So I got pretty pinks on my first go.
I'm on a break right now. The tannin and mordant has been applied to fa roc I am using today. There is calendula on the burner now. And after a snack I plan to start dyeing with it and exhaust the madder pot. The pinks should get lighter and lighter.

09/28/2019

And it officially begins! Napkins and bandanas are being scoured. After lunch I will set up the dye pots and be ready to roll. Trying something different than we did in Vermont that came from a great book. I'll elaborate more later when I see results. .

09/26/2019

Something quite satisfying about this!

The jars in the tray are repurposed (famous maker) candle jars I got from someone here locally. They are the absolute perfect size for some of the consumables I'll need for my dye projects.

The I collected in Vermont and dried when I returned home. There are also I collected at the end of our street. The are both amazing .

I have been collecting equipment and consumables and plan to do some dyeing this weekend, FINALLY. I found some dye stuff I had purchased a while back. I can't make up my mind what color I want to start with. Madder (Red), alkanet (purplish), osage orange (yellow orange), turmeric (yellows), calendula (yellows) or tannins to see how dark brown I can get from the acorns. Decisions. Decisions.

What would you like to see?

09/10/2019

Received more seeds for the dye plant garden next spring today! I cannot wait!