Eucalyptus cinerea in the '“Little Forest” (as my daughter calls it) behind the shed
I thought I would experiment with natural dyeing using the eucalypt trees around the house, and to document the colors from each of the different species. The first one that drew my attention was Eucalyptus cinerea, also known as the silver dollar tree, Argyle apple and Canberra blue gum.
Below are all the colors from the one tree! The first two - red and orange, are the colors made from just the leaves of E. cinerea; one dye pot had a lot more leaves (red) than the other. The rest of the colors were created by placing some of the dyed wool yarn into jars with modifiers - rustly nails for iron, alum (aluminum potassium sulphate) and bluestone (copper sulphate).
E. Cinera on wool with and without modifiers
Process:
Wool doesn’t need any mordant (allows the color to stick to the material) when you are using tannin-rich dyes like eucalyptus. So, all I did was put the lengths of wool (four lenths gently tied) in an old aluminum pot (that I only use for dyeing), added a lot of Eucalyptus cinerea leaves and fresh water; then boiled it for a few hours on the wood heater. Once I could see the color of the wool change from ‘natural’ to the red at the top of the picture above, I took the pot off the heater and allowed it to cool overnight.
Mordants:
Next, I mixed up the modifiers (minerals that change the color of your dye). Using three glass jars I poured some of the strained dye into each jar and added the following modifiers:
old, rusty iron nails - produces greys and browns
alum - produces yellows and brighter shades
copper sulphate - produces greens and darker shades
Then I added one length of yarn/wool to each jar, placed the lid on and put them outside in the sun for a few days. I gave the jars a good shake each day and when I liked the colors I strained each jar and washed out the wool with fresh water (using gloves so as not to absorb the modifiers through my hands). I hung them on the washing line to dry then stored them in a box with bags of fresh lavender heads to discourage the moths!
I did this process all over again, but with less eucalyptus leaves and got slightly less vibrant colors. The original color is the second from the top in the picture above (it is hard to tell the difference between the second and third colors). I find it amazing that so many vibrant colors can be produced by one plant!
note: I tried dyeing cotton and linen that I had mordanted in soymilk, but very little color was taken up by the fibers. I also added some mohair to the dyepot and it came out nicely. So, just for reference, cellulose fibers do not work well for this kind of dyeing, but animal fibers do.
weaving with E. cinerea dyed wool yarn, on a makeshift loom, and mohair (right-hand side)
I intend to keep a journal of the finished product by couching lengths of yarn to fabric, but I haven’t gotten that far yet. For now, I am creating a random weave using the yarn and will keep you posted on my progress….
N x
Amazing colours, I have these trees at my place, I had no idea of the beauty possible.