Our Dahlia Discovery

Katie and I have had a brilliant week exploring the extraordinary range of colours we can extract from the wonderful dahlia

Living in a small rural village I am surrounded by neighbours who treasure their gardens, one of whom has the most magnificent display of dahlias. After nights of heavy rain or significant winds some of the enormous petalled heads drop over the wall and onto the pavement. In my slightly desperate search for colour I was sneakily taking these fallen flowers back home and drying them out in my shed. Unfortunately this gathering process is not a very efficient one and I only gathered about five dahlia heads before curiosity overcame me and I boiled them up. Initially the dye was rather unimpressive when it went on the paper but, as we know with natural inks, patience is the key. Sometimes the deeply dull can dry beautifully and these particular dahlias produced the most stunning green.

Dahlias were now, most definitely, on the Wild & Madder agenda.

Katie had a much more efficient approach to harvesting dahlias and actually asked her neighbour if she could have some of the flower heads when they reached the end of their season. The neighbour seemed thrilled that Katie was going to make good use of them and offered us the whole patch. So, armed with buckets we collected the most beautiful harvest.

The dahlia inks and dyes we have created range from pinks and purples to yellows and greens. They are so fresh and vibrant and the inks provide both a beautiful line and a lovely wash. The dyed fabric is just divine. As the days close in and our winter coats come out I absolutely love this process of taking something that provides such beauty in the late summer, early autumn, and turning it into something that can continue to create beauty throughout our winter months. Hooray for the dahlia!