Natural Dyes and Home Dyeing

A well researched and written book, with a wealth of useful information. The edition I have is unfortunately without any colour pictures, the info is however worth every cent.

A classic in the field of home hobby dyeing, Natural Dyes provides a historical overview of the field from its early days, information of the basic sort about mordants, fabrics, and dyes, and a series of reliable and effective recipes for dyeing wool with plant materials. As a textile arts demonstrator at a local museum, I always check my facts here, and refer to Androsko before trying something new. This book is valuable as reference and as handbook, and has the added advantage of warning the reader if a particular process is likely to be tricky or troublesome. Definitely worth having on hand!

This is an excellent book full of information and history of natural dying. The book goes over the history of natural dying and how it came about and was used by the European Colonists in America. There is a short history of dying during B.C. It then goes on to tell of how each colour was introduced and made. This section includes sketches of the plants Indigo, Madder, Annatto and Sumach. The second section of the book goes over colour. IT is too bad that there are no colour photos in this section. But it details about the variations of colour one gets from home dying, and the preperation and equiptment one needs to start. The best part of this book, however, is the 52 recipes for dyes made from easily obtainable natural material. The recipes help you to obtain the colour you want by equating this much plant plus this much moderant on this much fiber. IT is amazing to see how much the moderant has to do with the final colour. There are also charts for top dying. The book doesn't have much in the way of technique or how to prepare different materials, but the recipes take care of this and are worth it.