2018 Workshops and News

I could tell 2018 was going to be a busy year when it started off with a full class at Sturt Summer School. I had a great bunch of students, some of whom had never done any textile dyeing before, so I was really happy with the outcomes, and they were happy to learn all about printing with mordants.

Happy smiles all round! the Mordant Printing Class of 2018 at Sturt.

Since then I have been contacted by several Textile groups in various parts of Australia for some private workshops and I have finally (!) put some of my own workshops up on my website.

Organic indigo vat and resist printing and intro to shibori workshop

First cab off the rank will be an organic indigo and resist printing workshop  24th and 25th February - more information can be found here

Explore the local area, forage for dye plants that reflect the terrain

On 11 & 12 August a new workshop entitled "Local Colour & Dye" will combine foraging for plant materials and using scraps from the kitchen to create wonderful complex colours. Click here for more information.

Learn how to print with mordants to achieve a variety of colours and tones in
the one natural dyebath.

And lastly, the ever-popular Introduction to Mordant Printing workshop will take place on 8 & 9 September. More information here.

I will be overseas in the middle of the year undertaking two arts residencies - more about that exciting news closer to the time!

I hope you make 2018 a year to explore your creativity and connect with like-minded people who share your passion for textiles!
Best wishes
Julie

Creative Canberra Weekend

Despite the warnings that the weekend in Canberra was going to be heavy rain and freezing, my Indigo resist workshop was a wonderful way to spend the days indoors with a lovely group of women eager to extend their knowledge of resist prints and indigo dyeing.  We kept our strength up with delicious lunches and morning and afternoon teas in front of a raging open fire in the kitchen, just the perfect antidote to the crisp temperature outside. We explored many types of printing and monoprinting onto fabrics with two types of resist pastes and I encouraged students to layer their fabrics so that different intensities of indigo could be achieved.

Submerging the resist printed fabric into the indigo vat

Exploring cut stencils and screenprinting rice resist paste.

Creative use of clay resist using the leaves from outside.

Our happy group proudly showing off one of their samples
produced over the weekend.

If YOU would like to explore your latent creativity with textiles, my current list of wokshops is available on my website here

INDIGO WORKSHOPS

I Love Indigo!

Happy Valentine's Day to all you romantics out there in love with life, the joys of nature and, hopefully, textiles!

My husband and I have a tradition for Valentine's Day....you must make the card yourself, and preferably also the gift. This tends to be easy for me, less so for my husband, so we set a limit on bought presents for under $10. As you can see from the above image, he received a couple of indigo dyed hankies this year!

The recent spate of over-40-degree days has meant my indigo vats are at optimum performance so it was the perfect technique to make those presents the night before (I love indigo...its soooo quick!).

Having just run an intensive workshop on indigo vats at the Sturt Summer School in January, I am now taking bookings for a series of indigo workshops covering all the aspects of organic vats, shibori and resist paste dyeing. in Canberra. You can find out more information on each workshop here.

These workshops are suitable for beginners and also those who have had indigo experience before. So, no need to be blue - come and join in the fun!

Mastering the art of building up colour in Indigo

My indigo vat is at optimum health for dyeing right now!

Learn the art of resist paste printing with Indigo

Seriously AWOL....!

Woops!...what happened to last year???.....I got so caught up finishing off the NMA residency, ensconced in further research; and then sucked into the pandemonium of house guests for Christmas and New Year,  I somehow didn't find the time to write any posts for several months.  I had good intentions of starting afresh at the beginning of the year....but obviously that didn't happen either! I guess we've all been there, so here's a quick update.

After a fantastic NYE with my husband and friends at the Arboretum I had to drag my sorry self out of bed the next morning to drive to Sturt Summer School in Mittagong, where I was teaching an intensive week on organic Indigo vats. I had a full class of new and returning students from all over Australia, some who had already done short courses on natural dyeing with me in the past. This intensive week was all about ensuring beginners to the organic indigo process had a complete understanding of how the indigo fermentation process works; what occurs during the different stages of fermentation; and how to read the vats in order to keep them balanced so that our subsequent indigo dyeing would be successful. I also stress the importance of correct fibre preparation before dyeing, something I think is analagous to flossing teeth - its a bore to do but so worth it for healthy results!

I have recently seen some textiles by a Sydney duo who sell their indigo work for a lot of money and yet after only a few months, the indigo has faded to a pale wishy-washy grey-blue.  This could be indicative of a vat that has not been at optimal conditions for dyeing. Sure, you may get an indigo blue intially, but if the vat has not been balanced correctly at the point of dyeing then this is what happens - the indigo has not been fixed into the fibre of the fabric and therefore it is sitting on the surface and fades very quickly.

I first learnt how to dye with indigo back in the late '80's with my dye teacher, Virginia Harrison, however in those days we used synthetic indigo and chemicals such as caustic soda and thiourea dioxide (TUD).  It wasn't until I attended a class with Catherine Ellis and Joy Boutrup over in the US back in 2012 that I learnt how to make organic vats so that these harmful chemicals did not have to be used. Catherine and Joy's knowledge was immense and I am grateful to them for re-igniting my love of indigo dyeing.  However, it wasn't until I started keeping my own vat going for well over a year that I really understood how to care for it during different seasons, through winter dormancy,  and then balancing it and reviving it again. Indigo vats are like temperamental teenagers at times and you need to pay a lot of attention in order to get the best out of the vat, ensuring you do not waste the indigo that is in there because you think it has been depleted. Catharine has an excellent blog and is constantly pushing herself to know more about the process, questioning the status quo in order to try new methods and materials.

Anyway....I was keen to try some new reduction materials with my class as well, so we made up individual vats with lots of different summer fruits in order to test their ability to reduce the vat. For those of you not acquainted with indigo, it is not soluble in water and therefore cannot enter the fibre or fabric.  It must be reduced first under strict pH conditions in order to become soluble.  Then as it oxidises after dyeing it becomes insoluble again, but by then the indigo molecules have been trapped inside the fibre, forming one of the most fast dyes known to mankind. This has been proven by archeological research on grave goods from almost 6,200 years ago from Huaca Prieta in Peru.

A selection of our different baby organic indigo vats, happy in the warmth

During the week we tended our baby sample vats to see what fruits worked well with reducing the indigo.  Some of them were like sprinters - they gave colour very quickly initially, but then petered out over the week, needing rebalancing in order to optimise the indigo left in the vat.  Others were like long-distance runners - slow to start but still active at the end of our intensive week.  I was very impressed with both mango and banana  (cooked and uncooked),  and at certain times of the year you can buy them very cheaply from the markets when they are too over-ripe to sell.....perfect for the indigo vat.  I also think freezing the over-ripe fruit and then defrosting may also contribute to their efficacy, helping break down the cell walls quickly.

Whilst we kept our eyes on the baby vats, we had two larger vats with which to dye bigger pieces - my 18 month vat which I took with me, as a mid-blue vat, and a new henna vat which we made up and used for a stronger colour.  I wanted students to slow down and explore the ideas of using shibori together with indigo resist paste to build up colour and texture for their work. It is easy to just make a dark vat and get the blue-on-white wow factor, but in order to really understand the beauty of indigo it is best to attempt repeated dippings, overlapping shapes and textures to create many shades of blue in one cloth.

Some of the work on display during Open Studio Day

Beautiful resist work by beginner, Sue

Christine used a series of cut stencils with resist paste and
several immersions in the indigo vat to build up the tones.

Lynda concentrated on dyeing different silk yarns to use on
the handles for her ceramic tea-pots, and explored drawing
natural objects and pattern with resist paste onto cloth 

Sue produced  a simple yet effective shibori on
a thrift store linen shirt. She managed to keep
the rest of the shirt perfectly indigo-free as well!

Claudia painted freehand with the resist paste on one side of
the cloth in a technique she loves - zen doodling.

Towards the end of the week we experimented with over dyeing some indigo blue and white cloths made earlier in the week with some natural dyes, to demonstrate how you get natural, and colourfast shades of green. Compare the original indigo and white fabric at the back of the sample below, with the front fabric which has been overdyed with iris leaves, (these were growing nearby, so that's why we used them) giving a clear bright yellow and several shades of green. For a truly fast yellow, weld (Reseda luteola), would be my dye of choice.

Adele's itajime sample overdyed with iris leaves.

We had a great week and although the weather wasn't that kind to us (raining most days ....good for the garden but not for dye classes!) I am sure the students learnt a lot, and considering the majority were beginners to indigo, I am very proud of the results.

I will be running another indigo class in Canberra this year - if you are interested in attending please email me for details.

Indigo BLUES!

I held a really enjoyable workshop at the end of January at Timeless Textiles in Newcastle, followed by an equally enjoyable Introduction to Mordant Printing workshop the following weekend for ATASDA.  In between the two workshops I was also moving house after 17 years, so no prizes for guessing why I haven't posted anything until now....!
The topic of my post today is one I have been itching to write since my Indigo workshop, and one I know my students will find beneficial.  On the third day of the workshop our indigo vat, which had been behaving perfectly, decided to go sad on us and refused to cooperate.  Luckily we were all at a stage where we were getting ready to start packing up from an intensive 3 days, but it was still annoying and perplexing for me as to why it happened all of a sudden...hence the title...Indigo Blues...I was sad that all my tricks would not liven up the vat again.
Around the same time I had an email from one of my past students from last year saying the same thing had happened to her and what could I suggest the problems might be and how could she remedy it.  So here goes:
The vat we were using was an organic henna vat, I used powdered Lawsonia inermis (henna) with calcium hydroxide (builders lime) and natural indigo in the 1-2-3 ratio I was taught by Catharine Ellis. 
The vat was kept warm at night by standing it in an electric urn filled with water and then covered with plastic and blankets. The air temperature in the day was between 25-30C. In the mornings I would turn the urn back on until the vat got to dyeing temperature, I would stir it, wait at least half an hour and then take the pH and temperature before testing a small piece of white cotton before we started the day's dyeing.
So far so good.
After the vat failed we added the remainder of the 'mother vat' to it in order to spark it back up again but as this did not happen,  I realised that if that did not remedy it then I would have to monitor it more closely, as I knew that lack of indigo was not the problem, and the addition of more indigo would not produce darker results, I would just be wasting indigo. I purchased a green garbage bin with a lid from the hardware store that fit my whole vat inside it and carefully transported it back in my van to my studio in Canberra.
I put the vat outside in the sun to warm up, then I took a sample reading from the vat, took its temperature and pH.

Poor sad looking indigo vat, the flower is small and bubbles are white and pale.

The vat was not getting up to temperature, so I took it inside and warmed it in the bain marie urn again. Another stir, another test sample but still the vat refused to work.  At the end of the day I added 20g of henna powder cooked in 500ml of boiling water, then stirred it and left it over night. Here are the test samples from this first day:

The flower is in better shape and shows tinges of blue bubbles

Very pale results

 The following day I put the vat outside in the sun again and when the sun moved I bought it inside and heated it in the bain marie and took another sample.

Slightly better results

During this time I had been searching in vain to buy Fructose powder which is a more immediate form of sugar/carbohydrate for the vat (as opposed to henna).  Fructose is very difficult to find in Australia and especially in Canberra and I had a very frustrating time visiting websites and supermarkets, healthfood stores etc.  Henna and fructose both feed the vat to keep the reduction going.  Fructose is like a sprinter - it works quickly but burns up fast, whereas henna is like a marathon runner, it takes its time but lasts the distance, and the two substances can both be used as reduction agents in the organic indigo vat.

I then had to go to Sydney for a couple of days to teach a workshop, so the vat was again left to it's own devices. Whilst I was in Sydney, however, I mentioned my fructose dilemma to a friend and fellow-dyer, Sylvia Riley, who owns Silksational, the one-stop shop for fibres, fabrics and dyes.....of course she had fructose powder! What a lifesaver!!

On my return from Sydney I added 40g fructose to my vat, gave it a stir, left it outside in the sun and tested pH iand temperature. The pH was 12, but the dipped colour had gone back to pale again.All my dipped samples were for 2 minutes each in the vat, at least 2 mins oxidising.  I another variable I was monitoring, but which is hard to photograph for the blog, was the colour and clarity of the vat below the surface.  It should be clear and yellow/green when it is ready to dye with.  Mine was murky green and cloudy.

The bubbles were blue but there was also a blue halo around them.

However, the test sample is still very pale.

Moving house and life got in the way, so the next opportunity to tend to the vat came on 15th Feb, a full 2 weeks after the workshop in Newcastle.  I felt guilty for not attending to it every day, but knew if I kept at it it would come good, and that throwing the vat out was not an option because I knew there was indigo in there to use, and I hate wasting materials and money!

I added another 60g fructose to the vat, stirred and rested it. The next day (16th) I came to the studio, stirred it and tested it after half an hour.

Three tests in one day showing gradual recovery of vat

My first test at 2.30pm showed a small response from the vat - the colour was much darker than the previous day and so I continued to monitor.  At 3pm I added another 50g fructose, stirred and rested the vat then took a sample (#2).  I took the pH reading, and to my suprise the pH had dropped to around 8 - far too low for dyeing cotton, but actually predictable given that I had only been feeding the vat with either fructose or henna since it failed a couple of weeks ago. I now needed to re-balance the vat with lime.

16/2 pH tests at 3.30pm (left) and 4.30pm (right)

At 3.45pm I sprinkled a tablespoon of lime onto the surface of my vat...this was immediately sucked down into the vat, which I knew was a sign that it was time rebalance with more lime.  If the lime just sat on the surface of the vat then it would not need any lime. Over the course of a few minutes I sprinkled approximately 15g of lime onto the vat and watched it disappear into the murky depths below.  I took a video of this with my ipad and when I learn how to upload it onto my blog I will! As you can see from the samples and pH tests above, I stirred the vat, let it rest and then took a sample again at 4.30pm.  The colour had started to come back! I was on track.  I knew there was approximately only a half-strength indigo left in the vat because I had been monitoring it and the quantities I had used and the amount of fabric we had dyed in the workshop, so I realised I wouldn't get a very dark blue - that would be unreasonable - but I did know that there was indigo left in the vat and it was just a matter of working away at it to get it out again.

17/2 The Flower was looking good and the surface started to get that reflective
'oily' look on the top with a skin starting to form in the afternoon.

Final test from recovered vat.

I did a final test for pH, temperature and then took another sample. This was a beautiful mid-blue in keeping with the amount of indigo I think was left in the vat (40%).

The moral of this story is that your indigo vat may not be completely exhausted even though it is not giving you any colour - it may just need monitoring and the addition of reduction agent (henna, or fructose) and/or lime in order for the vat to recover.  If you throw it out you are wasting precious indigo.

Hopefully this post will give you some insights into how your own vat can be monitored and recovered.  Obviously if you dye a lot of fabric the indigo WILL eventually run out, however I had kept tabs on this and knew that there was indigo left in the vat...somewhere....!

 Here are two examples of  resist-paste indigo fabrics I did during the workshop I taught, intentionally alternating paste resist and indigo dipping to achieve the many shades of blue.

Multiple additions of resist paste and dipping to produce this
multi-hued indigo cotton fabric

Resist paste screenprinted onto fine cotton voile.

I am forever grateful to Catharine Ellis and Joy Boutrup for teaching me this organic indigo vat, because I had learnt how to dye with synthetic indigo about 25 years ago and was not a big fan of all the chemicals etc.  Having indigo on hand now really supports my natural dye practice, so that I can obtain more colours naturally as well as improve the fastness of them.

Hope this has helped you with your indigo vat problems and happy indigo dyeing for the future!

My website has an events page where I list my upcoming workshops, but please feel free to contact me directly at info@julieryder.com.au if you would like further information or you would like to book me to teach a specific workshop for your group. You can also comment directly on this post below and I would appreciate your feedback.