Over Dyeing is a technique which takes advantage of the fact that two primary colors mixed together produce a secondary color. Red mixed with yellow makes orange. Blue mixed with red produces purple, and blue and yellow make green. For instance,in traditional dyeing mixtures like weld (yellow)--over dyed with woad made the color we call *lincoln green.* More complicated techniques which use this principle are batik and katazome, and yes, even tye-dye. They use the layering of colors to produce unique hues.
However, BEWARE!! Too many colors have a bad habit of producing just brown!
I suspect part of how these techniques developed is that many of the natural dyes are yellow. Unless our ancestresses wanted to run about glowing like the sunshine, they needed to learn to mix colors. Both woad and indigo are blue dyes which tone yellow into the green ranges. Madder, which has an orange cast anyway, would turn weld yellow into a neon orange.
Here is a simple summer project to make use of some of these principles. Keep it relaxed!
Natural Dye Project: Take a large hank of wool roving and soak overnight in alum solution.
Meanwhile the same evening simmer the weld and let the weld soak overnight in the dye bath. The next day strain. Toss in the roving. Simmer for an hour and let soak overnight. Remove and rinse in several baths of clear water. You should have a nice bright yellow.
Now for the fun part. Decide on what final secondary color(s) you want to produce. The easiest to produce are greens, blue-greens and oranges so make a selection. You may wish to do a bright orange yellow mix to celebrate summer or to cool the yellow down with green and blues.
So select either madder (red) or indigo or woad for your over dye.
Prepare the solution and place several dowels over the pot. Loop the roving so that the bottom of the loop hangs into the solution. Soak overnight.
To over dye and intensify the second color loop the yarn over the rods and soak some sections overnight again. These sections will look darker than the the rest. Soak as before in several baths of cool water to rinse the extra dye.
Let dry.
To produce a verigated yarn, pull the roving apart and spin irregularly matched colors. Or recard and mix to produce a heathered tone. But watch not to over mix, or you'll just get a medium blend of the color extremes.
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