Natural Dyes by Sophie Morille

I found these natural textile prints by Sophie Morille last week, and I love the way she uses muted colors and shapes from nature in her work. She uses ferrous sulfate (iron), a natural mordant, to transfer images on to fabric. She also writes a blog cataloging all her work. It's in French, but the pictures speak for themselves, and there is so much more to see on her blog than is listed in her shop. Take a look, it's a new favorite of mine!

I've been wanting to branch into natural dyeing, and have been looking at a few classes and workshops to take in the future. I did a lot of natural dyeing and work with mordants in India, and I would love to try it again and apply it to my own work. Some day down the line I would love to try growing plants that can be used to make natural dyes, like indigo and marigolds. The book A Weaver's Garden looks like a great resource for starting a garden like that, and hopefully in the future I will have space to give it a try.

Photos from Sophie Morille

Speaking of books, I've had Color: A Natural History of the Palette and Blue: The History of a Color on my reading list for a while, and need to make time to read them. We take the use of color for granted today with chemical dyes, but there is so much history behind each color, and how it was traditionally used and made. Has anyone read them? What did you think? I will make sure to do a review once they have made their way up my reading list.

Until I start dyeing fabrics myself, I will just keep reading Sophie's beautiful blog for inspiration.