Natural Dyeing: Ecoprinting

It has struck me recently how many creative and talented colleagues and friends I have and I wanted to showcase some of their creations and stories for you. Christine makes the most beautiful creations using ecoprinting – all using natural dyes from leaves. I hope you will enjoy her journey.

How did you get into ecoprinting? What was your creative learning journey with this? Have you always been creative?

I went on a 5 day intensive shibori (Japanese resist dyeing) workshop as I absolutely love indigo dyeing and the patterns that can be made using shibori techniques and wanted to learn how to do it.  I enjoyed every minute and came home with lots of different dyed pieces of fabric and made more at home.  Then the question of what to do with it – as a quilter there was really only one thing to do – make a quilt! – I did this and my husband absolutely loved it.  For my birthday he bought me a book on natural dyeing by India Flint (Eco Colour). This book had lots of information on natural dyeing techniques including ecoprinting.  I really liked the look of the patterns she had achieved using ecoprinting, especially the beautiful colours achieved using eucalyptus leaves.  As I have a few different kinds of eucalyptus trees on my property and close by I thought I would give it a go with a silk scarf that I had………….but I couldn’t get it to work.  So, I found another workshop for natural dyeing by Merrilyn George and learned where I was going wrong.  I came home and got the process working and haven’t looked back.  Although, every time I got out to my ‘studio’ (in the garage) I am still experimenting!

Can you explain the basic process?

Ecoprinting works best on natural fibres, wool and silk give much more vibrant prints than cotton and linen, for example. I also print on paper.  The process for all substrates is the same:

1. Soak the fabric/paper in a mordant solution.  A mordant is required to bind the natural dye molecules to the substrate (forming a strong bond).  Without a mordant natural dyes are not colour fast. Examples of mordants are metal salts such as aluminium potassium sulphate (alum), aluminium acetate, copper sulphate, tin oxalate, iron sulphate etc. Other types of mordants include tannins, white vinegar, soy milk.  The choice of mordant depends on the type of fibre and the effect that you want.  For example, alum will brighten the end results, while iron will darken the end result.
2. Rinse and remove out excess water.  Place the fabric/paper on a bench and place leaves on top.
3. Apply pressure by either rolling up the fabric or placing a tile/metal plate over the paper and tie/clamp the bundles together.
4. Apply heat by either steaming the bundles over boiling water or submerging the bundles in a pot of boiling water (with or without added plant material).  Heat for 2-3 hours.
5. Remove from the heat and open the bundles – the natural dyes from the leaves will have transferred from the leaves onto the fabric/paper.
6. Rinse and dry the paper/rinse, wash, dry the fabric.
7. Make something cool – I make bags, cushions and zipped pouches from upcycled wool blankets, I have also done some upholstery pieces; printed merino tops; silk scarves, silk zipped pouches, silk sewing kits, silk lampshades, and with the paper I make framed prints, bookmarks, lampshades – but I am always thinking up new things to make and sell on my market stall.

What leaves/plant material can you use? What works best? What doesn’t work?

Eucalyptus leaves are gold – they have lots of oils/tannins/natural dyes and print from browns through to bright orange – depending on the species.  There are also thousands of different species to experiment with. Silver dollar (E. cinerea) and black peppermint (E. nicholii) give great orange colours. Eucalyptus leaves also print on both sides on the leaf (the sun side – which is the upper side and the moon side – which is the underside) which means that you can use leaves on half the fabric and fold the fabric in half to make symmetrical patterns, or place another sheet of paper/fabric on top to make reverse prints. There are plenty of other plant species that will also print – such as rose, blackberry, feijoa, maple, grape, fig, oak, walnut, sumac, hydrangea will give good prints but usually only on one side.  But the other side, or leaves that don’t give up colour, can also be used to give a ‘ghost’ outline on paper as colour from the other leaves tend to leach into the paper. Unfortunately native plants don’t work very well, if at all, for ecoprinting.  Their leaves are often too waxy or they don’t contain sufficient tannins/oils/dyes.

What fabrics/textiles can you use? Is the process the same for all of them or do you need to adapt it? What is your favourite fabric to use?

Wool is the best fabric, it takes up the dye so well 😊

 

Where do you get your inspiration from? How do you decide the design that you are going to make?

I don’t really think too hard when making the patterns – I just use the leaves I have to hand and see what happens 😊

 

Do you have end products in mind when you start or do you just dye fabrics and see what inspiration comes afterwards?

Yes I usually know what the piece will be for.  My main products are bags and cushions for the wool and scarves for the silk (I use silk scarf blanks).  Any silk that doesn’t come out well I will cut up and use to make the smaller projects (zipped pouches and sewing kits).

 

What is your favourite or that you are most proud of?

I made some printed wool (from an old wool blanket) and used it to reupholster a chair – it looked amazing!

What has been the most challenging (product, material or aspect)?

One of the most surprising and challenging aspects is reproducibility – nothing is reproducible – I can use the same material, same leaves, same mordant, same dye bath, same heating conditions and the results are often completely different.  However, this is one of the things that I come to love about the process and, as noted above, every this I do now I see as experimental as I never know how it will turn out.

 

What is the best lesson you have learned? What advice would you give someone starting out with ecoprinting?

Best lesson learned and advice to newcomers is get some expert advice (e.g. find a workshop) to learn the basics – I had multiple failures at first but one quick workshop gave me all the practical advice missing from a textbook– and as mentioned, there are so many choices – fabric, mordants, leaves – it’s really easy to get it wrong but once you have a basic understanding of the process, the opportunities to create something unique are endless.

Christine sells her ecoprinted pieces at various markets and is contemplating an online presence as well. She plans to have a market stall this year at the Greytown Christmas Festival (26 July 2025); Rathkeale Christmas market (1 November 2025); Martinborough Fair (first Saturday of Feb and March 2026), Riversdale Easter Eggstravaganza (Easter Sunday 2026). 

 

If you have enjoyed Christine’s story and want to explore a range of different creative hobbies, see some of my other ‘Featured Artists’ posts under the ‘Craftroom’ tab at the top of the page.