Second Thursday Tutorial: dyeing fabric and paper using red cabbage

This tutorial is what I would call a failed experiment.  I tried two different techniques and neither one lived up to the promises I saw on other sites.  However, I have spent too much time working on this, so I will show you my HONEST results, which are unlike those found on other sites.

I'll begin with my first experiment and the materials I used. From left clockwise:
1 small head of cabbage *
large glass bowl
disposable gloves

*I don't normally buy products for my monthly tutorials, instead preferring to use what I own.  However, for this project, I had to buy a head of cabbage.  I bought the smallest one I could find.  It was $1.79/pound (USD) and it weighed 1 pound 5 ozs.  I paid $2.36 (USD) plus tax for this cabbage.

Instead of doing a lot of cutting, I gave up and mostly tore the cabbage.  I wore gloves and if you decide to reproduce this project, I suggest you do the same, unless you want bright pink hands and purple fingernails.

Somehow, I failed to show what I did next.  I covered the cabbage in cold water and placed it in the refrigerator supposedly overnight.  As it turned out, I left it there four days, and, although the web site owner said it would turn a deep purple, I only got a very dull brown in FOUR days!

Being a scientist, I decided to try to understand this process.  Conducting a bit of scientific research, I discovered that red cabbage is what is known as a substantive dye that contains a water-soluble pigment called anthocyanin.  Depending on their pH, they may appear red, purple, blue, or black.  This information will come in handy as I change the pH of the cabbage.  Anthocyanins belong to a class of molecules called flavonoids.  For someone dyeing using cabbage and other anthocyanin pigmented kitchen veggies, this means that the pigment can bond to natural fibers without a mordant. 

For the cold process, chop or tear red cabbage leaves as I did and place in cold water.  Supposedly, anthocyanins are heat-sensitive and will activate in cold water.  I placed my bowl of cabbage and water in the fridge, but my anthocyanins could have cared less about the cold.  They refused to allow the cabbage to turn any color, much less dark blue as the blogger suggested.

After waiting around longer than I should have (sadly, the second Thursday this month was here before anyone realized it), I proceeded to try my luck with heating the cabbage.  My supplies are above.

Baking soda, ammonia, salt, and baking powder will be used as a mordant or to change the pH of the cabbage.   I forgot to bring out my vinegar and rust mordant, though.  I guess I was distracted because I had to make a trip to the store to buy ammonia and salt.

I'm not sure I have much pure cotton.  I brought out everything I had that even faintly resembled cotton, though.  I was hoping to dye some of the lace, too, although everyone warns anything with polyester will not take the cabbage dye or will dye very light.

What is left of my cabbage is above.  I spilled some of the water on my cheat sheet and you can see the cold water didn't do much at all to the cabbage.

Once again, I tore cabbage leaves, but this time, I added hot water and a bit of salt to set the dye.  Every web site will tell you to cook over a hot stove for an hour, but if I can prepare something in the microwave, I'll do it.  Note how the cabbage head keeps getting smaller and smaller.

I cooked this in the microwave for 15 minutes, checking every three minutes.

I'm loving the purples and greens I'm seeing in the dye bath.  It was time to remove the cabbage from the dye bath.  I used a slotted turner designated for dyeing fabric.

The dye bath is now ready for the fabric.  It is pH neutral, or as neutral as my bottled water I purchased can be.

There are different ways you can prepare your fabric, but you MUST begin with clean or PFD (prepared for dyeing) fabric.  Even if it's labelled PFD, I wash it in mild detergent first. 

Please note:
If your fabric sits on a shelf for any length of time, it will ultimately gather dust.  If you handle it, you get oils from your hands on the fabric.  That's why I suggest always washing in mild soap just prior to dyeing any fabric.  Be sure to rinse the fabric until it runs clear.  After all, you have to start with wet fabric anyway.  This way, you know your fabric should be free of dust and oils and will more freely accept the dye bath.

I used my slotted turner to push the wet fabric into the dye bath.

Since I still had a bit of room in the dye bath, I decided to add a small piece of lace.

I microwaved my fabric in the dye bath for 15 minutes, checking the fabric every 3 minutes.   I liked the color of the dye bath, but was not especially impressed with the fabric.

I decided to cut a sheet of 90 lb. watercolor paper into quarters and dipped one piece in the dye bath.

This was definitely underwhelming.

After rinsing and drying the fabric, I was once again less than satisfied.  Somehow I expected it would be darker.

Even more disappointing was the lace.

Here I compare the finished project with the original fabric.

This is the same for the paper, too.

Ruminations:

1. The cold dye bath did nothing and I wasted days I didn't have while I waited for the dye bath to turn purple.

2. It seemed like everything I wanted to try, I had to buy something in order to dye it.  I had to buy the cabbage and the salt, which you have to add to any of the dyeing processes you want to try.  I also purchased the bottle of water to keep the pH level constant over all the processes.

3. Thankfully, I already had the vinegar, baking soda, and baking powder, but had to buy the ammonia.  These are all needed to change the pH levels of the dye bath.  Unfortunately, I didn't have a chance to use any of these.

4.  Another item I had was iron "liqueur" I can use as a mordant, but I was out of alum, another mordant I must buy before I try my next batch of red cabbage dye baths.  I believe I have Cream of Tartar, which goes with the alum.  I also have old copper pennies I can use as a mordant.

5. Speaking of mordants, I didn't even have a chance to discuss pre- and post-mordant processes or discuss fixatives which set the dye and keep dyed fabrics from quickly fading.  Salt is a fixative, but there are others, too. 

6. Another concern of mine about salt is, it is often added to the fabric which is then cooked for an hour before adding to the dye bath.  Others say to add salt to the dye bath itself.  It's very confusing, so I need to conduct lots more experiments.

7. I feel I have only just touched the surface of dyeing with red cabbage, so I will continue with it next month, too.

Thank you for joining me today.  I greatly appreciate it.  Feel free to ask questions and if I can't answer them, I'll conduct experiments to help us all better understand this process.  Suggestions are always welcome and so are your own dyeing stories.