Botanical Dye Project

1. First Entry

· 200-350 word summary of your redesign challenge object:

There are many brands in the current clothing industry that combine botanical dye with fashion, such as Mute Dance, Pengtai, Elywood, and so on, which Inspire me a lot. While combining botanical dye with popular trends, I am also thinking about how to pursue sustainable development at a higher level through botanical dye, both from the perspective of production and consumers. Therefore, I decide to use collage and blind box mode to complete this project. My project includes two ideas. One is a design similar to remake, incorporating a collage design into botanical Dye. The design of the clothes depends on the consumers. As the designer, I will provide the finished fabric dyed with plants. It is the consumers’ decision how to stitch these fabrics together. The finished fabric I provide is also divided into front and back sides, using different plants and fabrics to dye completely different looks. It will provide more possibilities to design their own. Another idea is to combine the now popular blind boxes with botanical dye. The dye needed for botanical dye is provided to consumers who have no idea what the dye is or what it will look like. Let them do their own DIY and dye their clothes. I will combine these two ideas to complete my botanical dye project.

· 200-350 word description of your “ideal” user: (Include why and how this user will benefit from your redesign)

My ideal users are children. In the choice of fabric, I chose 100% cotton without bleach. In this way, whether the cloth or the dye extracted from the plant, can ensure the health of children. And I think this is a kind of artistic enlightenment for children. I use the form of blind box, which can greatly arouse the interest of children, but also to a certain extent let the children have the freedom to design their own clothes. Children can improve their hands-on skills and at the same time imperceptibly educate people about environmental protection at an early age. The collage design allows children to wear their clothes in more ways. For example, a small strapless can be used as a skirt, and two pieces of cloth can be used as a scarf when they are stitched together, realizing “more than one clothes”. In this way, children can have more ideas about their own clothes and styles and their aesthetics. can be cultivated. At the same time, parents of children can also reduce the demand for clothes for their children to a certain extent, reduce unnecessary waste and realize the concept of sustainable development. My project will also provide users with instructions. Children can also pick plants outdoors by themselves and dye them according to my instructions with their parents. This will increase children’s outdoor sports time, promote parent-child interaction, and let parents know more about the concept of environmental protection, so as to further put sustainable development into practice from the perspective of adults.

 · Mood board containing inspiration images, your sketches, etc:

2. Botanical Dye DIY Mordant Preparation

· Iron Mordant

I began to make this mordant on March 6th. The nails I found were so rusty that when I added a 1:2 ratio of water and vinegar to the jar, the liquid immediately turned this brown color, which I don’t know whether it is rusty orange or not. After a few days of observation, it was still the same color, so I just chose three pictures.

· Copper Mordant

 

Because of the delivery, I started the copper mordant on March 12th. I added a 1:1 ratio of water and vinegar to the jar and put 100 3mm copper pipes and 100 2.5mm copper pipes into it. After finding the color changed very little, I add 200g shot copper and a 16*100mm copper bar, and more vinegar in it. The color started to turn blue after three days. I broke the jar accidentally on March 25th, so the mordant was only half left. The color became bluer because of this accident.

3. Project Planning

4. Botanical Dye Procedure

Safflower Hypothesis: I predict the safflowers will produce a red color. The red color may be of different shades depending on the assists.

Gardenia Hypothesis: The colors will turn out to be yellow. Because of different assists, the darkest color will be earthy yellow.

Gingko Biloba Leaf Hypothesis: The colors will be brown because I chose the brown fallen leaves.

· Cut the cotton cloth into 24 pieces

· Boil safflowers, gardenias, and ginkgo biloba leaves to extract dye colors

· Boil the cotton cloth with mordants

· Add assists, observe the changes in pH using pH strips, and dye the fiber

5. Final Result

Botanical Dye Procedure

*I find that the lemon juice and cream of tartar can make colors lighter, but baking soda will make colors darker. I wonder why this happened, so I searched for some information and asked some of my friends who major in chemistry. It shows that the colors turn darker after baking soda is because of the chemical reaction called Maillard Reaction. Maillard Reaction refers to the polymerization and condensation of compounds containing free amino groups and reducing sugars or carbonyl compounds at room temperature or at heating. After a complex process, some brown or even brown-black macromolecules like melanin or melanoid are formed, so it is also known as Carbonylamine Reaction.*

6. Product

I cut the cotton cloth into tow equal pieces, and dyed one pice of cotton cloth with three colors and left the other one with no color (which is for the consumers to dye and design).

I also wrap the mordants and dyes for my product. ( The consumers will be given a random mordant and a random dye.)

Modeling of the product ( Be creative, there are so many ways to coordinate these two pieces of cloth. It’s up to the consumers. By this way, the “one for all” idea is achieved, and the principle of sustainability is practiced.)