Pinky

hhock10Remember this jar on the right?

It was eventually done cooking on the stove. 2 days like the other 3 skeins, ph 2, as high as I managed to get it. Pure vinegar with some acetic acid. I measured again when done and it was closer to 1.

I was very excited to see if it would keep its rose tint during the dye process and of course after. Well, here you go:

hhock25
Dry skein reeking of vinegar
hhock26
Skein rinsed then dried again.

Unfortunately it seems that rinsing out the vinegar will push it towards purple once it dries. Even if there is actually a bit of vinegar in the 2nd rinse water. OR it could be heat. See, I wanted to wrap up this post and put the yarn close to the stove. The most wet ends turned more purplish than the rest before I noticed and moved it. Sic! So, heat definitely pushes it towards purple. As well as time.

I meant to do another skein in there upping the ph slightly – but I lost steam, didn’t get to mordant more yarn, and, well.

I’m going to re-photograph all the skeins later, as they do seem to change a bit after curing. I also don’t always rinse them until they’ve dried and rested for a bit.

And here they are:
hhock29

* * *

Dre asked me about pH change during the process. I did not measure at each temperature shift, but the juice in the above photos, which started out at 8 and 2, are now 6 and 1 (or that’s as low as my strip goes). The two jars in the window however have not changed since I made them, they’ve been in temps between 15-20 C.

Just for fun I think I’ll stuff some fleece in the highly acidic jar, then afterwards dip it in the former alkaline jar. Which is now no longer alkaline, where did that ammonia go?!

Fun fact which unfortunately I wasn’t allowed to document: when I hung the pink skein to drip in the shower (white floor), the splash pattern was pink in the middle with a larger ring of drops around it, they were indigo blue! As well as the run off between the tiles, dark, dark blue.

Anyone care to take a guess at what happened there and is it related to the pink/purple issue of the finished skein?

11 thoughts on “Pinky

  1. Pia, to get that range of colors from one plant is amazing. I am very interested to see how they all hold up to light over time. Wonderful variations. I keep thinking that it could be an interesting plant dye to create varigation within the skein through the application of differering pH dips if, after curing, they would hold through the rinsing. I have to ponder this one more.

    1. Some plant dyes react well to modifiers, others not at all. So yes, one could compile a list of the ones suitable for variegation!

  2. One thing I learned from all the conversations and research about fermentation dyeing is that part of the process that makes the colours stick so well is alternating the acidic dip and the alkaline dip. You let the yarn dry and cure between the two (if I remember correctly). But this is done on unmordanted wool, and that back and forth is a big part of what makes the technique effective. I think it might have something to do with the way acid and alkaline solutions open the scales on the wool. Makes me wonder if it would also work if the yarn actually was mordanted.

    Either way, you colours are gorgeous! And the experiments are awesome. I definitely have to buy some black hollyhock seed…

    1. Nope I didn’t dry them before using modifiers. I think that would make them work less? But I’m sure you’re right that the fermentation would give different results.

      The tin mordanted wool did not go to green in an alkaline bath, so there’s a lot of factors.

  3. Helt vidunderlige farver. Min stokrosefarvning gav neongul-grønne farver, der falmede hurtigt. Kun alunbejdset garn og simret en time.

  4. Hi I am so glad I stumbled across your blog! I am relativly new to spinning and very enexperienced at dying

    Lovely to read all this information the wonderful colours you have achieved

    I shall return!

    Susan

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