This week on FEEDBACK FRIDAY: How to channel the color of champagne on silk with a natural dye like cutch
Every week for FEEDBACK FRIDAY, we are emailed with questions from our natural dye community asking simple and complex questions that we thought might be worth sharing. Of course, all of your burning questions are answered by natural dyer in chief, Kathy Hattori, Founder of Botanical Colors.
How is that beautiful champagne color produced with cutch? The one depicted on the cutch extract product page (on silk). It says with soda ash but things I’ve read say adding soda ash reddens the dye. I just love that champagne color.
If you mordant with aluminum sulfate on silk or wool, you get that golden shade from cutch (see above). It’s only with protein fibers and only with aluminum sulfate as a mordant. It may be possible to obtain it on cellulose if you use a small amount of a mild acid like cream of tartar in the dye bath, but I have not tried this.
Can dried madder root be to old to produce reds?
It’s possible that old madder root can lose its potency over time as a natural product. Most madder root has a shelf life of about 3 years when kept dry and airtight, and ground madder may become weaker over time sooner than whole madder because it’s in powdered form.
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