I boiled beets for dinner shortly after reading Lisa's post on dyeing with black beans, and before tossing the thick red water out, I thought...why not? I had some white silk left over from my preschool dyeing project, so torn a piece off, pushed it into a jar, poured the beet juice on top of it, added salt for good measure, sealed the jar and set it on my windowsill.
The next day, with great anticipation, I rinsed the water out of the silk and was quite surprised at the result...pale pink? I don't know why I expected something deeper...perhaps because when I peel beets, the juice always stains my hands a deep crimson. Then I spotted the (almost empty) bottle of red wine. Again...why not? Another piece of silk gets pushed into the jar, wine (Malbec) and salt added, and back to the windowsill. This time when I rinsed it out the next day, I got the deeper red I was expecting with the beets. Both shades are quite beautiful.
Wanting to play with the silk I cut quarter inch slices into the ends and tore off several strips of each color to get this nice batch of silk ribbon.
And now...I'm playing.
Not sure where I will go with this but it sure has been a fun experiment.
