Folded Shorts with Clothes Peg Markings.
I love clothes, I love shopping and finding bargains. I am always excited about how many things I can get for a low price. Occasionally there is a story on the news about a tragedy in a factory in the Far East where some of my cheap clothes are manufactured and I will be conscious for a few weeks about the amount of suffering and slave labor that went into the items that I am wearing, but I will still head out to the stores and purchase some more bargains. My closet is full and overflowing with clothes that I barely wear, when there is closet space I fill it with stuff. I am supporting slave labor.
Recently, I talked to a lady who described clothes mountains filling up landfills in third world countries where our used clothes are sent to die. These clothes are seeping toxic chemicals into the ground from our synthetic fabrics and dyes. We are using synthetic dyes in our clothing that not only pollutes the earth but also may cause cancer and other health problems.
I searched the internet and found a few lists of clothing companies that are making an effort to provide eco friendly clothing. I want clothing that uses unbleached organic cotton, linen, bamboo and silk. I want the dyes to be natural and the workforce to be treated fairly and humanely. It was hard to find any companies that were doing all of these things. My favorite find so far is: Faeries Dance.
It was Mother's Day a few weeks ago and my daughter bought me a book of natural dyeing techniques, The Modern Natural Dyer. We decided to have a try at dyeing some fabrics and to experiment with decorative techniques. We used a variety of materials from around the house and garden and used Turmeric to produce a bright yellow dye. We had a few items that we were going to donate to Goodwill to experiment with.
First of all, we selected a few items that were mostly white, we tied a scarf with cotton thread and then switched to stones and elastic bands because the technique was too slow. We folded a T shirt into pleats and tied it to a stick with raffia. Another T shirt was twisted and a ladies top was twisted into multiple elastic bands, finally a pair of shorts was folded and then clothes pegs were used to hold it in place.
The next step was to treat the fabric so that it will take the dye. We added the items to a large cooking pot filled with one part vinegar to four part s water. We boiled it for one hour.
The next step was to rinse the fabric. We filled the pan with water and brought it to a boil. We then added half a cup of turmeric and boiled for 10 minutes. Then we added the fabric, weighing it down with a brick so that it would be covered. The T. Shirt on a stick was too tall to be submerged so we just dyed on half of it to see how it would turn out.
We then boiled the fabric for one hour because we wanted a really bright shade of yellow. The final step is to drain the dye, rinse the fabric and dry it out.
Here are the items hanging up to dry.
From left to right: Rubber band tunic, pleated and stick rolled T. Shirt -half dyed, Rolled T. Shirt.
We are happy with the silk scarf and the elastic band tunic but the other items will be dyed again in our next experiment - indigo dyeing!
Silk Scarf - Middle Section -Stones and Elastic Bands, Ends are Cotton Tied Sections.
