Last Friday we had Alice Sowa presenting on bacteria dyeing in Iceland! Fjólublár/Living Purple is a collaborative, ongoing research project between the Icelandic Textile Center and research lab BioPol on creating a sustainable dyeing process for Icelandic Wool with the purple dye produced by the bacteria Janthinobacteruim lividum.
We’ve been watching Alice on Instagram and are just so interested in the work she is doing.
Watch the recording below.
Here’s a bunch of links Alice shared with us during her presentation:
Bio: Alice Sowa is a multidisciplinary designer drawn to textiles, ceramics, cultural exchanges, and using design as a means for innovation through connections. She has a BFA in Industrial Design from Massachusetts College of Art and Design and has recently completed Fabricademy’s 6 month Textile Academy program in Iceland. Throughout the program she explored the intersection between textiles, digital fabrication, and biology that all contributed to her final research project on development of Bio-Pottery. This summer she has been researching bacteria and natural dye processes on Icelandic Wool for the Icelandic Textile Center x BioPol research project Fjólublár/Living Purple.
What Botanical Colors’ dyes does she use as part of her research?
Throughout the research of Fjólublár/Living Color Alice has been using our new cold water mordant aluminum triformate and aluminum sulfate in her bacteria dye and natural dye tests. In her personal work she uses these alums to mordant her fibers she dyes with Botanical Color’s cochineal and madder extract. To get a wider range of color she over dyes and experiments with different shibori techniques with a 1-2-3 fructose indigo vat from Botanical Colors.
FEEDBACK FRIDAY
If you are not familiar with FEEDBACK FRIDAY, every week, we speak with dyers, artists, scientists and scholars about our favorite topic, natural dyeing and color. Curated by Amy DuFault, Botanical Colors’ Communications Director and co-presented by Botanical Colors’ Founder Kathy Hattori.