Dye Garden Design

Backyard homesteading has been going strong for a while and edible gardens chicken coops and beehives are ubiquitous even in urban neighborhoods.

Dye garden design. Garden construction and design. This year put aside a portion of your garden that you normally dedicate to flowers and herbs to plant a rainbow of natural dye plants. The praxis natural dye garden is located at the corner of corsica avenue and e 156th street.

In today s world we grow edible plants so we can eat healthier but very few people think of growing plants to dye with. The praxis natural dye gardens. While i drew a dye garden design earlier in the year part of the fun for me is allowing it to evolve once i m out there in the sun yanking out an enormous crop of borage leaving some behind of course to install a bamboo teepee to plant with runner beans for kids to hide in this summer.

Planting a dye garden beyond the environmental reasons growing plants and dyeing with them is a way to reconnect with the natural world much like growing our own food is. Clear out existing plants prepare the bed build its infrastructure implement design and fill it with all the topsoil and compost it needs. We believe natural dyes are an opportunity to make a sustainable intervention in the apparel supply chain and the cornell natural dye garden has become a hands on and direct source of knowledge for students to learn how to cultivate.

The cornell natural dye garden was started in the spring of 2015 as an opportunity to cultivate a variety of colors for textiles that come from the natural world. Plants used to make dyes for coloring textiles yarn and clothing. Until the mid 19th century natural plant dyes were the only source of dye available.

Nature has its own subtle palette of colors and this little garden represents a few of the dozens of plant dye. A natural dye garden will give you eco friendly natural dye pigments for textiles knitting yarns soap making and even artist paints and pastels and children s art supplies. However once scientists discovered that they could produce dye pigments in a laboratory that would stand up to washing were quicker to make and could be easily transferred to fibers creating dyes from plants became somewhat of a lost art.

As vejar writes in her book the practice of naturally dyeing becomes a way to honor and enjoy nature like gardening or taking a hike. There has been some evidence that the commercial products used to make vibrant colors in our clothes can be just as dangerous as the commercial chemicals used in growing our food. Maybe you have already started a garden or have.