dyeing with mustard yellow polypore - Phellinus gilvus

The little polypore I found the other day - the mustard yellow polypore - gave me some color in the dye pot.

After noticing the interior had an ochre color, I tore some up into pieces and put them in a mason jar filled with water and a splash of ammonia.  After letting it sit for a day I put the mix in my dye pot and let it simmer for about an hour, adding a little more water in the process, then turned off the heat and let it set overnight.

The next day I strained out the mushrooms and put them back in the dye jar, where they are still making color, and added my fiber to the dye liquid.  I heated the dye pot up to just under a simmer and let it heat for about an hour, then turned it off and let it, too, sit overnight.

I let the fiber dry in the sun before rinsing it.  I feel that the color gets a chance to "stain" into the fiber more, and I also get a sense as to how lightfast the color will be.

From left to right above - unmordanted wool, wool mordanted with alum, and undyed wool for comparison.  Beneath the wool is unmordanted silk and cotton, and unmordanted cotton floss next to undyed cotton floss for comparison.

The mordanted wool took up a really lovely golden color while the unmordanted wool is a very pale wheat color.  The silk and cotton floss also picked up a lovely golden color while the cotton cloth picked up only a small amount of color.

All in all, a lovely experiment, and one I'm glad I did.  When I went to check on these mushrooms yesterday they were all dried up and almost unrecognizable.  I may try dyeing with the dried ones too, just to see.

naturally dyed stones

It's been a busy week.  I'll be back soon, but in the meantime here are some naturally-dyed stones to look at.  (you'll be seeing them again soon)

Have a lovely weekend, all!

Lisa

freakish

The weather is supposed to be freakishly warm today, hitting almost 90.  Now, 90 is an odd thing where I am, but odder still when you look outside and there are still snowbanks by the garage and ice tsunamis blowing off the lake.

Speaking of freakish things...

 I had been soaking a cotton t-shirt in some soy milk to prep it for dyeing and somehow forgot about it.  Until it started to smell funky, then I said "oh yeah!"  At which I put it outside.  And forgot about it.  It sat in a crumpled up lump, only partially rinsed of its soy.  When I remembered it (again) and picked it up I noticed that it had splotches of a gorgeous royal blue.

I found a thick patch of it and the blue appeared to be a mold or fungus or slime of some kind, but I'm not sure.  It left imprints on the fabric where it had been folded up and the layers touched.  How cool is that? 

 I have no idea if this fungus mold thing will degrade the quality of the fibers, or even if I can get the stench out.  I do know I plan to fold it back up and see it if will keep producing color.  

Just maybe a little further from the house...

 Hope your day is interesting too.

new wool mushroom terrariums

 

The other day I shared a few in-process pics of a new mushroom terrarium I've been working on.  I can finally call it completed and wanted to share its story.

 

Mothers aren't supposed to pick favorites, but...(and don't tell the other mushrooms I've made) this one could possibly be my new favorite.

Every bit of fiber and thread in this piece has been dyed using plants, roots, and nuts that I gathered from the woods.  By hand.  Me and my dye pot.  There are black walnuts, goldenrod, tansy, lobster mushrooms, wormwood, and more.  Tans, pale greens, yellows, pinks... That patch of moss is a grey-green given to me by an unusual mushroom called Peridoxylon petersii, and I've yet to find another.

 

There are blades of grass, and tiny flowers, and a caterpillar.

 

Even some sporophytes are hiding in there.

 

 I made the wood base from a piece of Osage Orange, a wood hard enough to make my saw spit blue smoke when I cut it, that came from my hometown in Illinois.  I left a bit of the bark on the piece as well as checks (small cracks) and imperfections because they made the piece feel even more natural to me.

  
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From the bottom of the base to the top of the glass, the piece measures about 8 1/2" tall.

I'm sort of taken with it.

 I've also managed to finish up a couple of teeny scenes too.

 

These little cuties are also hand-dyed, but not exclusively with natural dyes.  They are heavy metal-free, though, and crafted with love.

 

The wood bases on these are made from Alder, a wood that has a beautiful smooth grain.  I've left some character in the wood on these too. 

 I'll be having a little shop update on Tuesday the 16th at noon, central time, if you'd like to stop by and give one of these guys a good home.

s h o p

Monday in motion

 

It's Monday.

This past week I've coaxed pink from orange mushrooms.

 

I've begun needling that multi-colored wool and am delighted with the earthy texture it's creating.

 

I've put new stuff in the dye pot.

 

And made plans, lots of plans.

 With luck and lots of coffee (and oh man, a babysitter would be a dream come true) I might get some things done.  Time to get in motion.

Have a great week everyone.

lobster mushroom-dyed scarf

On Wednesday I gave you a glimpse at a piece I had just finished and today I'll show you what those folded layers of edible-looking pink were.  You might remember that back in September I had been dyeing wool and silk with lobster mushrooms, well this scarf is what came of that lovely fiber. 

I nuno-felted that soft merino wool into a layer of silk.  The resulting texture is nubby and mottled, and oh-so-interesting.  It's soft enough to be worn next to the skin.

The color varies and runs from mauve to fuschia.  In the spots where the silk bubbles up through the wool, you'll see a pale ballerina pink.

This is a shorter scarf but because it has some give, it can be tied once around the neck.  I've made a wool pebble brooch as a closure for it as well which allows the wearer to tie it in different ways.

I used all of my lobster mushroom-dyed fiber on this piece so there will be no others like it.

It amazes me what is possible with natural materials.  Granted, doing work this way is far more labor-intensive than grabbing a box of Rit and some polyester, but the results are so rewarding for me.  I have a piece that is unique and easy on the earth, but I also got to have the experience, the learning experience, from making it. 

This is why I do what I do, and oh how I love it.

This scarf will be in my shop shortly and I'd be grateful if you'd check it out, or share it with someone who might like it (any pink-loving mycologist/nature lovers out there?), because I'd love to be able to continue to do what I do.

Have a wonderful weekend, everyone.

dyeing with dog's nose fungus - Peridoxylon petersii

I found this unusual fungus back in August while out in the woods.  I had never seen one before but it looked remarkably similar to Charlie's nose, hence the term "dog nose fungus".  Funny enough when I googled that very term, I quickly identified this fungus as the Peridoxylon petersii.  It seemed I wasn't the only one who thought they bore a resemblance...

  There were several growing on a highly decayed oak log so I pried a few off and took them home to identify them and see if I could dye with them.

Charlie saw it in my hand and gave me a "say what?" look.  I had to reassure him that it was just a fungus and not an actual dog nose.  That would just be wrong.

It had a very woody feel to it and while the top was a shiny black, the sides had a hint of very dark green in them.  I was eager to see if I could coax any color from it but since I didn't have time to dye with it right away I popped it in the freezer inside a resealable bag.

I recently pulled it out and made dye with it by chopping it into bits and simmering it in water.  It quickly began turning the water into a brownish color so I was hopeful.  I mordanted two strands of wool yarn, one in alum and one in ammonia, and left a third without mordant.  I was surprised to see that the yarns picked up a green color from the dye, since the dye itself looked brown, and that the unmordanted yarn held the color the best.

I put my unmordanted merino wool in the dye bath and simmered it for about an hour.  It came out an olive green, more green than what this image is showing, and I couldn't have been more excited.  I did a second batch in the same dye and only came up with a tiny bit of color.  I did notice with this that the color really developed with heat.  The yarn that touched the bottom of the pot was more green than the middle, and the same was true with the roving.

I have another mushroom in the deep-freeze that I'm eager to try out, and I'm crossing my fingers it's as exciting as this one was for me.

Have you had any happy experiments lately?

 

dyeing with Phaeolus Schweinitzii

"Mom!  I found a mushroom!  Come and look!"  My little ones are often calling me from across the yard to check out their finds.  It isn't often that my oldest, the teeeeenager, does so when he beckoned me the other day, I was curious as to what he found.

He showed me a large yellow and brown mushroom at the base of a pine tree.  I stood there thinking "I know this mushroom, I know this mushroom..."  I hadn't ever seen one in person before but a quick look online confirmed that the boy had found a Phaeolus Schweinitzii, or the Dyer's Polypore. 

I quickly finished my chores so I could chop this mushroom up and put it in the dye pot.  I simmered the chunks in water for about an hour while I mordanted some wool with alum.  When the dye seemed ready to go I let my wool, some silk, and a length of cotton floss steep in the hot dye.  After it had cooled I pulled from the dye pot an amazing mustard yellow that I love.

I did a second batch and got wonderful results once again.  I ran out of dyeing time so I froze the rest of the mushroom chunks to try again later.

I read that it's possible that the Dyer's Polypore may fruit again in the same spot so I'll be watching that pine again next year.  The presence of the mushroom is also bad news for the tree so it's likely that it will soon be firewood.

Have a great weekend, everyone.

dyeing with lobster mushrooms part III

This weekend, after dyeing wool with a different mushroom (more to come...) I sat down at the computer to find more information about what I had just worked with and came across an incredible blog that has changed the way I look at mushroom dyeing.  Shroomworks' blog is amazing and I read it front to back all in one sitting.

She mentioned in one of her posts about lobster mushrooms that she used washing soda in the dye bath.  She was getting lovely colors, much deeper than the pale peach and yellows I've gotten, and I was inspired to try again.  Our lobsters are now past-prime for eating (eating mushrooms trumps dyeing with them, for me) so I gathered up the mushy and bug-eaten for the dye pot.

I started by cutting just the orange outer skin from the mushrooms, another of her tips, and put them in my dye pot with some water.  I let the pot simmer while I mushed up the mushroom chunks with my pastry cutter.  When things started looking soupy, I added a few sprinkles of washing soda and kapow! Color!

I was so excited at the colors I got that I did several exhausts, resulting in various shades of pink and fuschia.  I dyed large pieces of silk and fine merino with the hopes of making a nuno scarf, because how cool would that be?!  I also dyed a small amount of cotton floss and a piece of vintage doily.  I love them all.

Even though I'm not much of a pink person, I am beyond thrilled with these results.  I've frozen the lobster mushroom chunks as I think they have more color to give, and I'm sure to revisit this again.  I can't wait.



natural dyeing with lobster mushrooms part II

Lobster mushrooms are a delicious, useful, and fascinating thing.  On a good day of hunting in mid-August I can usually find enough of them in our woods to make a delicious dinner and the whole house smiles when they see me trudging out of the woods with a heavy basket.

The lobster mushroom is kind of different in that it's actually the product of a mold attacking another mushroom, morphing it into deliciousness.  The flesh is firm, not mushy like some mushrooms, and it gives off a beautiful golden color and slight seafood smell when cooked.  We like ours sauteed in butter and garlic and tossed with pasta.

  

As lobster mushrooms age their flesh turns to a cranberry red.  Last year I used some of these past-prime mushrooms to dye fiber and achieved a peach color on wool with an ammonia mordant.  This year I wanted to try dyeing on silk without using a mordant, just to see what I would get.

None of the mushrooms I used this time had degraded to the point of being cranberry red and mushy, rather I used some that were just a little old and some of the wormy bits that were cut off of the good mushrooms.  This seemed to make a difference as the resulting dye color after simmering down the mushrooms in water yielded this orange color instead of red.

I scoured my silk, stuffed it in the jar with the dye, and let it percolate in the heat for about a week in my small greenhouse.  The silk took up some color right away and it only deepened slightly over the course of the week.

At the end of the week I removed the silk and gave it a rinse. 

The resulting color is an orangey yellow, a little deeper than the photos are showing.

I'm really loving using the silk for dyeing and can't wait to work on a project with some of these pieces.  What I love more is when I can use cast-offs like mushroom bits, onion skins, carrot peels, bean water, etc. for making something beautiful.  It makes me look at my compost pile in a whole new way.

I hope you're making some fun discoveries today too.