Mordant Monday: A Great Red with Madder Extract

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My notes on how to make a great red.

Madder extract is the perfect ingredient for a beautiful, vibrant red that almost glows because it has a gorgeous golden undertone. Sometimes the color veers toward a winey burgundy (equally beautiful), but I wanted to get almost a glowing ember feel to this yarn. To so this, I used a little bit less madder and the minimum amount of calcium carbonate.

Here’s how I did it.

Materials

• Wool yarn (I used Jagger’s Green Line sportweight yarn in Alabaster, but sadly this yarn is discontinued). Any natural or undyed white wool can also work. If you use a cotton yarn or another fiber other than white wool, you may need to modify this recipe to achieve similar results.
• Orvus Paste @ 1%
• Aluminum potassium sulfate or aluminum sulfate @ 15%
• Madder extract @ 6%
• Calcium carbonate @ 1%

Instructions

1. Measure 1% wof Orvus Paste and add to a dye pot filled with enough lukewarm water to cover the yarn and allow for easy movement. Stir the Orvus Paste to dissolve, if needed. Add the yarn and gently bring to 175F. Scour the yarn for 30 minutes, rotating the yarn occasionally, and avoiding felting and tangling. The Jagger yarn was very clean; the scour water was clear.
2. Let cool a bit and rinse gently in the same temperature water as the yarn to avoid felting.
3. Rinse out and refill the dye pot with enough lukewarm water so the yarn moves easily in the dye pot. Set the yarn aside (you can let it drain a bit, but try to keep it damp).
4. Measure 15% aluminum potassium sulfate or aluminum sulfate in a small container and dissolve with hot water. Add to the dye pot and stir.
5. Add the yarn carefully to the mordant pot and mordant for 60 minutes at 160F. Hold for 60 minutes, rotating occasionally and gently. I no longer mordant at super high temperatures (180-195F) because I tend to get called away and inadvertently boil the yarn. We still get beautiful colors with the slightly lower temperature and the yarn feels better.
6. Remove the yarn from the mordant bath and let drip, or gently squeeze out excess mordant with gloved hands. Alum mordants are astringent and can dry your hands.
7. Rinse out and refill the dye pot with enough lukewarm water so the yarn moves easily in the dye pot. Don’t turn on the heat just yet.
8. Measure 6% madder extract on wof and dissolve the powder with hot water off the boil.
9. In a separate container, measure 1% calcium carbonate on wof, add hot water and stir well.
10. Add the madder extract to the dye pot, and then add the calcium carbonate. Stir well.
11. Add the mordanted yarn and slowly start heating the dye pot. I put it on the lowest setting for 10 minutes while occasionally moving the yarn to avoid hot spots. Then I start heating, still on low or medium low for another 10 minutes while occasionally moving the yarn, and repeat this once more. Once the dye pot temperature is at about 120F, I raise the temperature until it is at 150-155F. Hold for 30-45 minutes. The color should change from a weak orange, to rust, to dark rusty orange to a deep red with orange undertones.
12. Remove the yarn and let cool in the air. You can also let the yarn cool in the dye pot overnight, although I did not do this with this batch. Once it is cool enough to handle, rinse gently in lukewarm water to until the rinse water is clear. Hang to dry away from direct sun and heat.

Where’s the Cream of Tartar?

Cream of tartar is a great mordant additive for dyeing as it helps keep wool soft and assists with mordanting. In this case, we didn’t use cream of tartar along with the aluminum potassium sulfate as it will shift madder to orange, making it challenging to achieve the red shade we were after. If all you have is yarn mordanted with Cream of Tartar, try the tips below to help develop the red shades in the yarn.

Making it Redder

Depending on your water source, your results may create a more orange shade. In order to deepen it toward red, you may need to add more calcium carbonate. Try adding 1% more to the dye bath by removing the yarn, mixing the calcium carbonate with water and adding it to the dye bath. Stir and re-enter the yarn. If the yarn stays stubbornly orange-ish, remove the yarn and add 1/16th of a teaspoon of soda ash (approximately .2 grams) and stir well. The dye bath may turn slightly more purple. Carefully add the yarn back into the dye bath and rotate gently. After 15 minutes, check the yarn color and it should be redder. You can repeat these steps to achieve a deeper, more burgundy red as well.

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Materials we used