A few weeks back, while I was busy slaking clay from the yard, I set aside a handful to use as a dye. My instructor Nancy from the Woodland Pottery class I took had mentioned that it could be used as such, and I figured I'd give it a whirl.
I had a plain white t-shirt of my own, and a pale yellow shirt for my daughter to play with. I found a how-to on Prairie Fibers' site, and I followed her instructions for immersion dyeing, mostly.
Much like any natural dye process, there was scouring and mordanting to be done. I didn't have the recommended soda ash for scouring so I used washing soda instead. The instructions called for tannin to mordant with and I used acorns since I had tons of those on hand. I simmered them in water for about an hour, strained them out, and added my shirts.
After prepping the fabric, the clay is dissolved in soy milk and the shirts are allowed to sit in the mixture for a week or more. Here's where I got a bit sloppy. I probably added a bit too much clay, and definitely didn't stir my fabric around enough (I had a pretty narrow vessel, next time I'll use a more open bucket), as evidenced by the blobs of clay and bare spots on the fabric.
I let my shirts cure for about a week out on the line then rinsed them well...really well...it took some effort to get the clay off. I brought them in and handwashed them, and I was left with a mottled pink/beige color. I wondered how it would wash up in the washing machine, so I tossed it in with a load of laundry. Since it was raining it also went through the dryer instead of being hung on the line. I thought for sure that I'd be back to a plain white t after that treatment, but surprisingly, the pigment held.
The result is pretty interesting. I really like the mottled look to it, but it's a little too close to my skin color for me. I'm wondering what would happen if I overdip it in a different dye color, maybe a black walnut, just to deepen it. I also thought of doing some Alabama Chanin-style applique work to it. I'm just not sure.
Any ideas?
At any rate, not bad for a handful of mud. I'd like to try this with again with a different color of clay.
Have a great start to the week, everyone.
