Dying yarn with natural dyes

Dying yarn is a really fun way to extend your knitting passion. Not only can you create awesome skeins of yarn in exactly the color you want, you can also reclaim ugly skeins and make them more interesting with overdyeing.

One problem with dyeing yarn is the toxicity of the dye and mordants that you have to use. These are pretty harsh chemicals, and not everyone is comfortable with that. Just to be clear, when you dye using natural materials, there is still quite a lot of toxicity from the mordants. However, you can achieve some incredible colors using natural dyes, and there are probably some natural dye materials that you can harvest from your very own neighborhood!

Another caution about natural dyes: they tend to be less lightfast than commercial/chemical dyes. This means that they will fade in sunlight. Sometimes quite dramatically. Therefore, this is a technique that is best used on items intended for indoor wear. Or just learn to appreciate the transient nature of your art.

You always want to use animal fiber (wool and/or silk) for this type of dyeing. Cotton and other plant based fibers can be dyed, but the process is different. Acrylic yarn cannot be dyed at home, not that I'm aware of at any rate.

There are a lot of great tutorials on using natural plant dyes. Here's one that demystifies the process nicely. Basically you wash your yarn, soak it in a mordant, make the dye, and soak your yarn in the dye.

There are a wide variety of natural dye plants that you can use. Here are some that I found, along with the colors they create:

Rose petals: pink
Onion peel: yellow/mustard
Black beans: blue
Coreopsis flowers: yellow
Elderberries: purple
Ragweed leaves: green
Black-eyed Susan flowers: yellow
Zinnia flowers: beige/tan
Blackcurrants: maroon to purple
Red grapes: pale blue

Image courtesy Flickr/knitting iris