In the meantime I was thinking about all the really great plants much closer to home which can also make gorgeous colours. I thought I would share some of these ordinary wonderful things with you and show you how you could – very simply make lovely colours from these very common plants.

Here are a few plants which I hope you can get hold of really easily –

From left to right: Dock Leaves, Cow Parsley, Willow leaves and St Johns Wort stalks (that’s the plant with the pretty yellow flowers, also known as Hypericum. It’s leaves have got a very distinctive spicy sweet smell)

If you don’t have a garden I hope you can ask a friend or neighbour if they maybe have some or take a sneaky handful from the park.

All you need to make your natural dyes apart from the plant matter is some fabric and a pot to cook them up in.

First roughly chop up your leaves and stalks with a pair of scissors

Next – grab a pot. You can use one from the kitchen because non of these leaves are harmful and you can give the pot a good scrub out afterwards.

Next – Fill the pot with hot water and bring to the boil. Then reduce the heat and keep on a low simmer.

Now we can prepare your fabric. I’ve used little squares of calico – it’s just been washed. I haven’t used any mordants or anything special beforehand. You can use any spare cotton, linen or silk that you have to hand – just make sure it’s washed and clean.

Wet your fabric first before adding it to the dye bath.

Keep your dye bath hot and keep adding water so that it doesn’t boil dry. Do take the pot off the heat, for example overnight and just let the fabric steep in the dye – this is a great way to extract the colour.

After 24 hours your fabric should look something like this – the Dock leaves have turned the square of calico brown, the Cowparsley has dyed the fabric an almost illuminous yellow, the Willow leaves have given pink and the St John’s Wort stems a lovely browny red.

To finish off – run your fabric under the tap until the water runs clear. This way you know that any excess dye has been removed.

The process is slow but super simple. Once you’ve had a play with little scraps of fabric you could try larger pieces to make handkerchiefs, scarves, napkins, pillowcases….

And you could try leaving the fabric in for even longer – this is really SLOW textiles and the slower you go the better the result.

I do hope this blog makes sense and gives you clear step by step instructions for  dyeing your own fabric with common garden plants – please get in touch if you have any questions.

I really hope you have a go and please let me know how you get on – your results may not be the same as mine as different soils and weathers have an effect on the plant material but I hope you get something that you like X

Have fun X

The post Have a go at Natural Dyeing using common garden plants appeared first on Sarah Burns Patterns.

My friend and collaborator on the Steyning Imprint,  Alice keeps a flock of sheep. To me they always seemed like rather strange creatures to be interested in – wonderful as lambs (and very tasty) but rather stupid looking as they got older. But this was before I learned to love wool.

Every summer Alice pays the shearer to shear her sheep to avoid the dreaded ‘fly-strike’ (basically the poor sheep are eaten alive by maggots) and faces with the perennial dilemma of what to do with the wool. One summer we had a huge felting party with the kids and other times Alice uses the wool to wrap around fruit trees, stuff in her attic as insulator – she even used one fleece to fill a cushion…

In all the small villages and hamlets around us in West Sussex there are the clues to this one great English Industry – Cottages with names like Spinners, Woolgatherers, Weavers… My old Vicar is called Graham Woolgar (Wolgatherer). His ancestors are in the graveyard and on the walls of Steyning Town Football Club. But very little of this once great industry remains.

Ofcourse there are still a few craft spinners and fab places like Weald and Downland, Louise Spong at South Down Yarns, Debbie at Plawhatch keeping these valuable skills alive. But the real problem is there is there doesn’t seem to be much market for the local small scale wool being produced around us.

Infact small holders farmers we know are burning their wool because there is nothing else they can do with it. A natural, almost free product with great properties – water proof, hyperalleregnic, carbon neutral, compostable is literally going up in smoke because we no longer have small scale production chains to make the best use of this wonderful local resource.

Inspired by the likes of people like Louise Spong, by Alices’ husbandry and  all round ingenuity – last summer we decided to do something about it; stopping using plastic in our cushion pads (that’s what polyester is) and replacing it with wool instead.

We did not know what a labour of love this would be but as well as being a great deal of work it’s also helped me totally fall in love with wool and become alive to it’s many qualities.

To begin with we put the word out that we would be happy to take any unwanted fleeces and Alice’s shed soon filled up…

Processing the masses of the ‘waste’ wool our small valley had to offer from the flocks of people like Ronnie and the Vics at Annington Farm meant that first we had to find somewhere to store it all (sorry Daniel). Then we began by cutting out the worst bits of gunk (you can imagine ) then soaking the wool in a succession of scalding baths to remove the lanolin (the natural product made by sheep to keep them waterproffed – such amazing stuff).

After many of these we use a final bath of lavender water to scent the wool. We then fill pillow cases with the damp wool and leave them on the gentle heat. Then the business of teasing out the wool begins – it’s rather lovely to find crushed between your fingers on a dark winters evening – a summers hay grass…

Most of the the fleeces we were donated were Jacob’s sheep as Ben granny was a spinner and loved Jacob’s for their long staple (the length of the wool fibres). These Jacob’s have gradually made their way down the valley (they are great fence jumpers) and even Alice has a few now.

Somewhere during all these hours working with wool – pulling, tearing, stroking, teasing – I have fallen in love with what is the most amazing natural creation: soft, strong, pliable and resiliant. It makes me feel really happy to think we’ve saved even a small amount of this amazing natural resource and put it to good use.

So if you’re in need our cushion pad or two – do have a look at our cushion pads. They’re available in our standard sizes – 45cm x 45cm and 35cm x 50cm but we’re also really happy to sew up any size cushion you like. We think they’re really reasonably priced and offer a fantastic alternative to plastic polyester pads.

They’re all hand-sewn (by us!) using 100% organic calico.

The post Learning to Love Wool appeared first on Sarah Burns Patterns.

I’ve called my textile dyeing & printing business Dora Fabrics since I graduated from Chelsea – somehow it felt safer to be someone else but now I’m finally coming out as me – Sarah Burns Patterns and it feels good!

Here is more about me, what inspires me and how I work (thanks to www.handprinted.com for originally publishing this blog)

About me – Sarah Burns Patterns

When I’m designing, I start with an initial idea and cut my block vey soon as print making is an integral part of designing for me. I’ll keep printing and cutting and changing the block, editing the idea as it develops and being attentive to detail, colour, marks & scale… My goal is to create something that creates both harmony & movement – at the same time.

Although I went to Cambridge and studied politics, I had a lovely friend who was at art school and we used to block print together – after that I never really stopped even though I was working in a very different field (community economics where I met my husband the writer David Boyle). When I was 40 and my youngest son went to school full time I decided to take the plunge and applied to Chelsea to study textiles – I could cycle there and back to Crystal Palace in time to pick up the kids up. Studying with lots of super talented 20 year olds was terrifying (I was the only mature student) and exhilarating at the same time. I got a first class degree and learned how to work very hard & really shifted in my approach to colour and design.

When I was in my second year at Chelsea I started interning with Michal at Christopher Farr Cloth; she took me to the wonderful Ivo’s screen printing factory in Southall and when I graduated I got a job there as a handprinter. I worked at Ivo’s for 3 years, commuting between Sussex and Southall and probably learned more there than I did at college – about colour, technique and the craft of printing. I wasn’t very good at it but it gave me a unique insight into commercial production and English manufacturing. The waste and toxicity of the process also made me want to do things differently so when I set up my studio in Steyning I decided to work in a way that was kinder to the environment – I do believe that beautiful things should be made beautifully otherwise they aren’t really honest.

I’ve just spent two years researching and writing a book on the 1930’s block printers Phyllis Barron & Dorothy Larcher –who combined block printing and natural dyes. Their work has really inspired to work even more with natural processes.

One of the reasons I love print because it intervenes between my intention and the final outcome – it always surprises me and acts like an unknown collaborator. I also love that I am working in reverse – removing the line that I don’t want to print. I’m drawn to resist printing for the same reason. Colour and pattern is also very important to me – it’s a very emotional and playful thing in my life.

 I now feel very spoilt and have a workshop cum garage in Steyning where I live. I do most of my dyeing outside using whatever plants, fruits or roots are available seasonally and I always have an indigo vat on the go. I also grown lots of dye plants on my allotment and try to get up there most days with my dog Gwennie. Being outside and part of the seasons is very important to me – I try to plant something everyday, even if it’s just a handful of seeds thrown into cracks in the pavement.

I’m at my most creative first thing in the morning so I try and get all my blocks, fabric & colour prepped the night before so that I can get up early start printing first thing. The process of dyeing and printing has a definite rhythm to it and it’s one that definitely shapes my days and weeks. I normally print or dye all morning and then get on with other tasks in the afternoon – like preparing orders, organising workshops, talking to clients etc After supper, I often like to cut blocks as they are lovely and soft if you sit on the lino as you eat. In the evenings I’m not good for much excepting getting ready for the next day and maybe doing a bit of website admin. I often find that as I fall asleep problems that have been bugging me all day untangle themselves and new images float into my mind just as I doze off …

I’ve been print making for nearly 30 years – it sounds astonishing, especially to me. I’ve had some great teachers – Vivien Lodge at the Working Men’s College in Camden, Kathy Round & Mel Bowles at Chelsea, Podge at Ivo’s in Southall and my children – have all helped me develop in new and better ways. I remember reading somewhere that you don’t master any craft until you’ve put in at least 30,000 – I’m probably reaching the quota now.

I’m originally from South Africa I’m really inspired by the traditional shwe shwe cloth or German print that is worn traditionally by domestic servants – I’ve named one of my recent designs Margaret after the lovely woman who looked after me and my brother when we were little. I love vernacular arts and crafts – like the beautiful Romanesque carvings and medieval wall paintings you find in ancient churches around Steyning. Their bold colours and rthymic patterns are really wonderful. They are very honest and direct, made by incredibly talented and unknown craftsmen. I also like the immediacy and vitality of Peggy Angus for the same reasons. I especially like that she thought about and understood some of the reasons behind pattern making; for me making patterns is full of meaning and emotion and she devoted her life to teaching more people about that.

The actual process of pattern making and printing is what inspires me most – the fabric I begin with, the process of mordanting, preparing the dyes from roots and berries and the act of printmaking itself – at each stage materials change and marks alter, the smells, tastes and feelings – it’s a very sensual process and one I’ve become completely captivated by.

I also love drawing and I mark the beginnings of a holiday by starting to draw as much as I can all the time, everyday – I have lots of sketchbooks. When I’m most relaxed I dream about drawing.

The textile I am most proud is my map of world patterns – it took me several years to make. I collected stories from people all around the world and sewed their patterns onto a massive patchwork quilt of the world. The project taught me so much about our relationship to pattern and how patterns travel and change through culture, tradition and people http://unsewn.blogspot.com/2010/

There are a few pIaces where I sell my naturally dyed and hand printed fabrics: firstly through my website www.sarahburnspatterns.com

The lovely people at Guy Goodfellow Collection http://www.guygoodfellow.com also keep my work at their showroom in Chelsea. Virginia White has several of my designs in production as part of her fabric and wall paper collection http://virginiawhitecollection.com/fabrics/

and my friend Alice Garner and I run the Steyning Imprint together – making tea towels and other lovely things for sale through our etsy shop http://www.etsy.com/uk/shop/steyningimprint

Up coming projects include lots of events around my Barron and Larcher book which I co-authored with Michal at Christopher Farr Cloth. I’ve also been involved in helping with the Women’s Work show at Ditchling which celebrates craftswomen who turned their practice’s into successful businesses between the two World Wars – including Ethel Mairet, Alice Hindson, Phyllis Barron & Dorothy Larcher, Enid Marx, Catherine ‘Casty’ Cobb, Katharine Pleydell- Bouverie, Denise Wren and Elizabeth Peacock. It’s on until October so catch it if you can

My partner Alice and I will be doing a Barron & Larcher inspired workshop at Handprinted in West Sussex in November. I’m really exited to be following in their footsteps – pioneering low-tech, non-toxic textile making.

My advice for other printmakers and creatives is:

*Follow your passion and be brave

*Work hard and keep going – stamina is just as important as talent

*Try and learn something from everyone you meet – everyone has something to teach you

*Find good people to work with – the ideas you have together will nearly always be better than thoughts you have alone and they will be there to keep you going when you run out of steam

*Don’t be afraid to ask for advice and enjoy yourself!

The post Coming out as Sarah Burns Patterns appeared first on Sarah Burns Patterns.