Do you have blue spruce in your neighborhood? If so, grab yourself a few boughs and chop them up in your dye pot! By adding iron water to your brew, you can coax out the bluish tint from this evergreen to create gorgeous cool grays. This tutorial will show you how to identify & brew dye from a blue spruce, shift color with iron water and the resulting color swatch samples (cotton, bamboo & silk) with various mordants.
Pine & Spruce Branch Dye
Picking up downed evergreen branches of pine & spruce trees not only cleans up your yard, but can be repurposed into some beautiful colors in your dye pot. The natural tannin in the branches will give you a beige color on textile, but with the addition of all-in-one mordant of alum & iron water, you can achieve olive greens and rich browns as well. This tutorial will show you how to brew dye from foraged pine & spruce branches and expand your palette with an all-in-one mordant technique, plus the resulting color swatch samples (cotton & silk).