Natural black dye

Cotton is more difficult to dye black with plants than wool. It‘s possible but it takes time. Yet, it‘s budget-friendly & sustainable!

A couple of years ago I’ve already published a tutorial on how to dye cotton fabric blue with black beans using DIY iron mordant and a cold dyeing process. This is now a different method to dye cotton gray blue with black beans. You don’t need to mordant the fabric before dyeing it with black … Continue reading How To Dye Cotton With Black Beans (No Mordant) →

Creating deep black hues from natural dyes in four steps.

Natural Dyeing with Black Beans - Part of my Natural Dyeing Series. Step by step tutorial shows you how to dye yarn or wool with black beans.

Ok, here goes nothing! It’s time to start the dyeing process. I have done my best to document my full process, so apologies in advance for the length and detail of the post, but if you ever decide to try natural dyeing I hope you find it useful! If you are new to Acre, I would start with Learning H

Six years ago I did two post on how to dye wool yarn with black beans. As I have moved into dyeing cotton fabric I thought I would write a little updated post. You can read here the part 1 and part…

I grew up in woods filled with white oak trees. The big beautiful trees would drop their tiny capped seeds each season, covering the ground with a blanket of acorns. As I have experimented more with natural dyeing, I have discovered acorns produce incredible colors in the dye bath. On their own, the

Natural dyeing with acorns and walnuts produces lovely tans and browns. If browns and tans seem boring to you, remember that they can be a great base for overdyeing. I particularly like tan overdyed with indigo. It shifts the primary blue of indigo dye into something darker, and a little more like teal. Browns and tans can also be shifted to grays and blacks with a dip in an iron bath. Read on to learn!

Natural dye experiments