DYE JOURNAL - ONIONS SKINS

Onion skin dye! So bright!

An oldie, but goodie! Onion skins are one of my favorite kitchen scrap dyes. They’re easily accessible to just about everyone and don’t always require a mordant. I keep a jar on my countertop that I collect our onion skins in while cooking. Once the jar gets full, I usually put them to work in the dye pot! Here’s some of the colors that you can get with golden onion skins:

Absolutely stunning! L to R, top to bottom: 1st extraction (unmodified), 2nd extraction (unmodified), alkaline modifier, acidic modifier, iron modifier.

Details:

- Dye method: cooked immersion dye method
- Water used: rain water (pH of 7)
- Mordant: alum sulfate
- Materials to Dye Stuff Ratio (by weight): 1 : .5
- Materials dyed: 5 small material bundles are in each dye pot. Materials include wool and cotton yarn, cotton silk, cotton lawn, kona-like cotton, organic cotton sateen and Belgian linen.
- Extraction Time: the dye is extracted for at least an hour on active heat (low/medium). Material bundles are added to the pot and dyed for at least 2 hours (still on active heat and sachet bag of dye stuffs included). Materials are left to steep and cool overnight in the bath.
- Modifiers: after my initial dye bath, I modify 3 of the material bundles— one acidic modifier (lemon juice), one alkaline modifier (soda ash) and one iron sulfate modifier. These baths sit on active heat (low/medium) for about an hour.

(one material bundle will remain unmodified and the last remaining bundle will be put into the initial dye bath for a second extraction to test for levels of exhaustion.)

Wowie!! Even when I know what’s coming, this dye still gets me. What insanely bright, beautiful color!

Much like these onion skins, stay golden my friends!
— KB