dyeing with food waste was the way i taught myself the basics of natural dyeing. i saved some avocado pits, some red cabbage, and grabbed some tumeric from the spice cabinet and followed a tutorial i found on pinterest. i fell in love.
through this journey with natural dyeing and sustainable textile practices, i have branched out to using all types of dye stuffs. for workshops i have favored dyes like logwood, madder, and cochineal, which all render more saturated color with more of a “wow” factor. as time has gone by and i have deepened my practice i had a craving to get back to basics, recalibrate my process, return to that pinterest tutorial.
i approached the incredible team at ostudio, a creative coworking and artist space in bedstuy, brooklyn, with the idea of teaching a workshop surrounding dyeing with food waste. fefo, the owner, loved the intersectionality of this idea and how it fuses food and fashion in an alchemic way. the workshop was held in fefo’s incredible ceramic studio which had incredible light and space. we dyed with avocado seeds (pink), red cabbage (blue/purple), and red onion skin (orange/green). after a brief introduction to the dyes and the fibers we would be dyeing, we began to explore modifiers like alum and citric acid (from lemon) to adjust colors and extract a spectrum of color from just three dye sources. red onion skins turned green with the introduction of alum on cotton, red cabbage turned cosmic pink with lemon, and avocado turned blush with alum and lemon combined.
the workshop resulted in a rainbow of truly sustainabel and circular color, waste to wear. simply by saving everyday grocery items we can revitalize our clothes if they have a stain, tie dye a tshirt with non toxic dyes.
