When I have made dye from Avocado pips, using Sydney tap water, I have never achieved the bright pinks that an English expert obtains.
Someone suggested it may be due to the water, so with all this rain we are having, I have collected a bucket of pure rain water to see if the results are different.
15 avocado pips were boiled with rain water in an aluminium pot for one and a half hours. Once cooled they were squashed by hand and simmered another hour.
The watery dye was strained through muslin, and ready to go. I decided to use the same fabrics as used in my previous records, including supersoft 80%wool 20%silk, silk organza, soy mordanted cotton and Habutai silk.
Samples below, Left, Sydney tap water, Right rain water
Although subtle, there was a definite colour difference just by using rain water.
For the next test, I decided to use an op-shop bought (ie well worn) top made from Viscose, as I noticed my English guru, obtained strong pink results on this fabric.
Also I made my own Soy mordant with just soya beans and rainwater, using the exact directions given in the book by Rebecca Desnos (my guru).
I soaked 125g of soya beans in 1 litre of water overnight. I blended the softened soya beans and water and strained the fluid off through muslin, then added the remaining bean mash back into the blender with another 500ml of water, and when pulverised a second time, again strained off the liquid.
A portion of this concentrate was diluted 1 to 5 with more rainwater, and my viscose top was soaked for 12 hours, spun and dried, then dipped and spun and dried twice more, before being left to rest for a few days.
Water was added to the original avocado pulp which had been used to make the first dye, and it was simmered for an hour to make a second dye. The dye was strained and in went my top.
I was so surprised to see the colour of the white top immediately turn a strong pink. I put 2 samples of my hand spun silk and wool yarn into the same dye bath to compare the result to the yarn from the first rainwater dye.
Here are the results!
The good news is that both the wool and silk yarn, and the up-cycled viscose top dyed a lovely pink.
On the down side, although viscose is a cellulose fibre, its production wastes a lot of water and wood, and uses toxic chemicals.
I learnt that using rain water improves all the results, making my own Soya milk Mordant was effective, and using the avocado pulp to create a second dye produced a stronger and brighter pink.
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