Sunday, June 09, 2013

...open season again...


It’s been a while, I know…

Lots of work on the house right now, painting walls and stuff.

And working in the garden of course…

my poor walls !

Land Art in the back yard

the herbal garden

luckily I have a lot of help from Ingrid Anna

...


And… about dyeing: it's open season again, the weather is getting warmer so it’s time for me to experiment with all sorts of dye plants. First I harvested some common herbs to start with: nettles (Urtica dioica) and Herb Robert (Geranium robertianum) which are now fermenting in plastic bottles.

Wikipedia : Geranium robertianum, (syn. Robertiella robertiana) commonly known as Herb Robert, Red Robin, Death come quickly, Storksbill, Dove's Foot, Crow's Foot, or (in North America) Robert Geranium, is a common species of cranesbill in Europe, Asia, North America, and North Africa.

Nettles are known to give some green dye and Herb Robert is famous for its gold yellows !  
But with the fermenting dye method, you never know :) 
We’ll see !

I bought some strange dye plant seeds which I’m very curious about: Sunflower Hopi black dye (Helianthus annuus) which should give some black dye,  Amaranthus hypochondriacus or Prince-of-Wales feather (Amaranthus Hopi red dye) which should give some, well, red dye and Midnight Black Turtle beans (Phaseolus vulgaris) which should give me BLUE ! 







I’ll let you know how it went, 
but first they need to grow !
...




3 comments:

  1. Your garden has such an atmosphere and energy to it, and it looks absolutely beautiful!
    Oh, and I can't wait to hear about how your natural dyes goes eventually, that's some interesting dye plants you are mentioning :) It's so good that the dye season has started. I have started up with a few simple dyes at first, but I will soon be preparing one or two fermentations dyes as well.

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    Replies
    1. thank you Hilde :)
      yes the dye season has started, slowly but surely !

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