Dyepot Weekly #85 - Dyeing Wool Yarn with Onions

[@ChemKnitsTutorials]

Want to bring home these fun onion dyed yarns? They're available in the ChemKnits Creations Etsy Store! www.etsy.com/shop/ChemKnitsCreations/items?order=date_desc&section_id=23710721

[@luminariel3765]

Do you rinse the sizing out of the yarn before dyeing?

[@Marialla.]

I asked my grocer if I could take some loose skins from the onion bin, and he was more than happy to let me stuff a bag full and have it for free! It would only go into the garbage otherwise, so I feel proud of putting it to good use.

[@ChemKnitsTutorials]

This is such an excellent idea! I wish I had thought of that! I might try that before I start prepping the next version of this experiment.

[@purrrmeow5323]

i’m too scared to ask them that 😫😫😳

[@axellh]

I just happened to be near the onion bin in our store when they were cleaning the bins out. I asked and she just gave them to me!

[@seaboe1muffinchucker]

Mordant is "a substance, typically an inorganic oxide, that combines with a dye or stain and thereby fixes it in a material." You used vinegar to help fix the dye. Therefore, you used a mordant.

[@saulemaroussault6343]

Also onions are a well known “autonomous dye”, you don’t need a mordant since they contain one.

[@aprilhoy4010]

The little things make so much difference! I used vinegar and alum to dye my wool with red onions and ended up with a deep, almost greenish mustard gold straight out of the '70s.

[@ChemKnitsTutorials]

Ooooo! I plan to start using alum this summer. Mordants can really shift the colors a bit.

[@KittenBowl1]

Interesting experiment and thank you sharing the yarn dying journey! I loved the golden orange hue you got from regular onion!

[@HaydenHaystackArts]

Those browns/oranges are just gorgeous.

[@ChemKnitsTutorials]

Thank you!

[@moirainee5008]

That super wash takes color BEAUTIFULLY! I will definitely be trying this one 😍😍😍

[@ChemKnitsTutorials]

I'm saving up skins to redo this with mordant sometime in the Spring.

[@sarahbruehl6894]

Very cool! You can dye eggs with onion skins, too.

[@ChemKnitsTutorials]

Oh fun!

[@GoodWitchKnits]

Just discovered your channel. I really appreciated the comparison of different fibers, and I'm excited to watch other videos to see how other materials play out.

[@ChemKnitsTutorials]

Welcome to the channel! I'm really glad that you enjoyed this video. I don't always use these miniskeins when I'm using food coloring or commercial dyes, but I really like seeing how different dyes interact with different fibers quickly with these natural dye projects. Sometimes the results really blow me away!

[@melhartley2402]

This was surprising to me, thought the red onion dye would be more pink or purple. The results are amazing to me. But I am a newbie to yarn dyeing. I love your videos and I learn so much. Thank you.

[@ChemKnitsTutorials]

Thank you for watching, Melinda! I think that reds in general are pretty hard to get. Some of those bright vibrant pigments aren't very stable, so you get a lot of browns and yellows without mordants.

[@Pauni3]

Hello from holland. Love the way you do your video’s. Thank you!

[@ChemKnitsTutorials]

Thank you so much for watching!

[@ludouglas1]

The other thing you’ll learn is that natural dye doesn’t react like synthetic dyes so your dye in the pot wont exhaust. You cannuse the natural dyes over and over til they exhaust ( by getting watered down). And when you cook the onion skins first, just add water til the skins are just covered and boil them for an hour. Then reduce the heat or even leave them over night just to sit. Then the next day, re heat but not to boiling then add the yarn and simmer for an hour. If u use more skins and less water first you’ll extract much better colour.

[@ChemKnitsTutorials]

Oh absolutely. I've seen tea exhaust and the yellow onions did, but other natural dyes I used don't. I think I check for that to see how the colors are changing, and in comparison with my other dyeing videos. :D Thank you so much for these comments and tips! I am super excited to try this again.

[@ludouglas1]

@@ChemKnitsTutorials Well, I can't wait to see what you do. Have a great weekend. I hope your Thanksgiving went well. xx

[@ludouglas1]

@@ChemKnitsTutorials Oh, and cabbage s fugitive and fades out pretty fast so make sure to tell people that. As does beetroot.

[@ChemKnitsTutorials]

Thank you, Linda! The cabbage didn't even stay in my cotton long enough to hold, so I talked about that a bit in that video. :D I want to do cabbage again sometime, though, to see if I can get a bit more color.

[@gailexline8049]

Gorgeous yarns! I see colorwork in those two skeins! I will have to try this.

[@ChemKnitsTutorials]

Of all of the natural dyes I've extracted myself, this worked the best. I am saving up onion skins to give this another go!

[@marieking-stevason1775]

Beautiful colors!! The yellow onion is amazing, and the red onion is lovely 😊 Great experiment Rebecca!!

[@ChemKnitsTutorials]

Thank you, Marie!

[@Dovid2000]

Excellent tutorial on dyeing with onions.

[@ChemKnitsTutorials]

Thank you!

[@carlaincrestwoodky]

Beautiful color results!!! Thank you

[@ChemKnitsTutorials]

You are so welcome!

[@jeanettegirard2802]

I would love to see some dying with blue pea flowers. I got them as part of a tea and it turned my tea blue. It was so neat. Would love to see if this colors yarn.

[@ChemKnitsTutorials]

Oh, I think I know the tea you're talking about! the pH sensitive one? My guess is that it might work like the red cabbage - give a stain but then rinse out mostly after dyeing. however you never know until you try!

[@ChemKnitsTutorials]

I just ordered some of the tea. I'm not sure WHEN I'd make the video... but I will have it in my stash!

[@lieschenmuller6447]

Wenn man die Wolle vorher mit Alaun beizt bekommt man mit der roten Zwiebel ein wunderschönes Grün!

[@jillianhorsley5985]

Yummy colour's, nicely done.

[@ChemKnitsTutorials]

Thank you!

[@indyw3458]

My favourite video on food produce dyeing , so far. Amazing video. Thank you!

[@Marialla.]

Excellent demonstration! I hope you will try red cabbage next! I'm very interested in any dyes we could get from ordinary vegetables. Edit: I just found your red cabbage video! LOL! Watching it now...

[@ChemKnitsTutorials]

I'm going backwards through your comments. ;) I see that you already found that video. (and then I read the rest of your comment. LOL on me, too!)

[@caitlinreum100]

This is so fun! I can't wait to dye with onions!

[@ChemKnitsTutorials]

Unbelievably fun!

[@yermomom]

I can see I’m going to have to start saving my onion skins!

[@ChemKnitsTutorials]

They are so pigmented!

[@yermomom]

@@ChemKnitsTutorials I now regret throwing away the bag of onions we forgot about that was all sprouted! I could have salvaged the skins!

[@elisajylkka850]

You should dye only with the dry red onion shell, that way you will get really nice greens! 😊

[@ChemKnitsTutorials]

I'll have to start collecting it! Or, as someone suggested above, go to the grocery store and see if I can harvest the dry skins from the bin.

[@elisajylkka850]

@@ChemKnitsTutorials totally! Here in Finland you can get them free from almost every store, and even if you get a bag full of them it is like few cents :D

[@SpicyKdestiny]

I like that you used all those different materials. Really adds perspective. :)

[@ChemKnitsTutorials]

Thank you! I'm so excited to play with this more in the future.

[@fmg12551]

Many years ago - more than 40 - I took a course and we used onions for dyeing - so many years ago... we used many mordants > but we made 144 colours with these. from the yellows/browns

[@ChemKnitsTutorials]

WOW that is awesome!

[@valeriaquezada4958]

That's like lion mane yellow! So beautiful. Did you say onions have a natural mordant? Could the yellow onions have struck so fast due to the extra acid?

[@ChemKnitsTutorials]

It is possible that the yellow pigment binds like an acid dye. I have no idea if they're a natural mordant or not, but they worked super fast. I bet you could dip dye and create all kinds of fun patterns with it.

[@chrispe82]

When I was researching it I found that onion does have slight natural mordant, using the vinegar just helped it more.

[@valeriaquezada4958]

@@chrispe82 awesome! That's good to know. Most of the dye artists I've seen have used alum but the color still took an hour or more to strike so I was surprised how fast her's did!

[@tanyaseaman4126]

Onion skins should dye cotton really well -- I've done it with cotton cloth and yarns. But adding vinegar might prevent it from adhering.

[@annekuehn1935]

Animal fibers use vinegar/acid as a fixative and plant fibers need salt/alkali to fix the color so the cotton should have been in a different pot/mixture.

[@kimberlethlippington3711]

your video is exactly what i needed

[@ChemKnitsTutorials]

I'm glad I could help!

[@maylien]

Fascinating! I appreciate your efforts and the scientific way you go about this. I’ve been saving up red onion skins and yellow and avocado pits and skins but have yet to dye anything. Maybe when Life gets less Hectic? BTW have you tried artichoke water? After I pressure cook artichokes the remaining color green water turns to teal overnight if I leave it in my aluminum pot to clean in the morning. So I don’t know if it’s Time or reaction to aluminum or just unstable color.

[@ChemKnitsTutorials]

It could be a reaction with the aluminium. Some metals can act as mordants and shift the tone of the color. (Instead of buying salts, some people will even use rusty nails etc to help.) I haven't tried artichokes, but that is a good suggestion.

[@camie44]

I dyed with onions recently. I used alum as mordent and got much clearer yellow color, but also noticed that the amount of onion (skins) made a huge difference; I tried getting a light yellow, but when I had too much yellow onion the yarn became more pink. The color I got from red onion was more green-yellow, I think that's because of the mordent. I also heard that the PH of the dye bath could make a difference on the resulting color when using natural dyes. It would be nice seeing some more experiments on that 🙂

[@ChemKnitsTutorials]

Hmmm... so far I've only played with the pH with red cabbage, but it didn't occur to me to try it with some other dyes. I hope to do some with and without mordant type videos in the future.

[@maureengreen4008]

Question again Rebecca...do you think if 'you' (generally speaking) use more brown onion skins with less water, would the colour be more deep...more saturated?

[@ChemKnitsTutorials]

In this case, I think that if I used a lot more onion skins then I could get the color more saturated. The color exhausted so I'm not sure if I could have gotten something much darker from what I had here. Therefore I doubt the water level mattered very much. However, with less water, there could be even more tonal variation and light and dark patches.

[@sharonwaddell2548]

I want to try this with silk hankies and some short fibre merino card merino.

[@ChemKnitsTutorials]

OooooO!

[@HaleThePanda]

This video is perfect for the onion boy drama going on lol

[@GKDmomma]

Fascinating.

[@ChemKnitsTutorials]

This one really blew me away!

[@jesb29928]

Since no mordant was used, will this color disappear with wash? With the water running clear, it doesn't seem like it would, but I don't know.

[@ChemKnitsTutorials]

A lot of food based dyes (onion, beats, berries etc) are fugitive dyes. So even with a mordant, they will fade over time - especially with exposure to sunlight. Even with a mordant the colors would fade with time, unfortunately. When I did red cabbage, the colors mostly washed out immediately, so I would say that it could fade some with washing but not that much.

[@yermomom]

So do you think if you added salt, rather than vinegar, you’d get better results on the cotton?

[@ChemKnitsTutorials]

I'm honestly not sure. I haven't explored natural dyeing much on cotton intentionally (versus just thrown in the pot with other items.) I know that cotton needs other mordants compared to wool, but I'm still early on my wool natural dyeing journey.

[@deneennewbill7528]

Now I have to try this!!

[@ChemKnitsTutorials]

You should! This one is so much fun!

[@ludouglas1]

Yes, the colours are more muted because yoh used too few skins. But the red onion centre is a waste of time because the bits of red in the onion itself is so minimal as to provide little to no colour so just use skins next time and maybe use 4 or more red skins. its always fun to experiment..:-)

[@ChemKnitsTutorials]

I used the whole onion because I didn't have another use for them at the moment. ;) I had been collecting the yellow skins for a month or so and the red onions showed up by mistake from Amazon Fresh. I agree with just using the skins next time, but I think there's an impressive amount of color from the red with very little material in the pot. The yellow onion absolutely blew me away, I was not expecting it to exhaust! I want to pump up the volume with even more skins next time.

[@ludouglas1]

@@ChemKnitsTutorials Fantastic, that's great. I love natural plant dyeing. xxxxx

[@DonnaR1969]

I'd like to see the red onion skins only and not the whole onion, to see if that makes any difference to the final colour

[@ChemKnitsTutorials]

I'm curious about that, too! I don't use red onions a ton (I was originally only going to do the yellow in this video but when these showed up by mistake I expanded the scope.) but maybe I can get some skins fromt he grocery store.

[@DonnaR1969]

@@ChemKnitsTutorials I think you would get a better colour using just the red onion skins. Have you used indigo, I'm not sure what the plant is called, I've seen many different shades and even colours come from the indigo plant

[@kawenuunitsi3756]

Being Eastern Orthodox, red onion skins (not the whole onion) are saved up and used to dye Pascha/Easter eggs red. I think using the whole onion did affect the outcome for your yarn, but I haven't tested it myself, so future experiment!

[@emullinsstreams]

How did you store the skins while saving? Just on the counter, or did you freeze them? Is this a dumb question?

[@ChemKnitsTutorials]

Not a dumb question at all! I dried them and then stored them in a tuperware like container. (I think technically an old nuts container with a screw lid)

[@kweber8898]

I have a 100% cotton dress that is a bit of a cream-sickle orange. I absolutely love the dress but the color is a bit too bright for me. Do you think this would work to darken and tone down the color to be a bit more burnt orange? What are the risks of dyeing cotton when it is not white and you are unsure of what was used to dye it the fist time?

[@ChemKnitsTutorials]

Hmmm.... I'm not sure if the onions would be enough to overpower it. The only concerns with dyeing a cotton garment would be shrinkage when exposing it to a lot of heat. Make sure that you have a large pot with a lot of water so you can get more even coverage (unless uneven kettle dyed effects are what you're going for.) Good luck!

[@kweber8898]

@@ChemKnitsTutorials Thanks for getting back! Do you think a coffee dye would tone down the orange better?

[@kweber8898]

Or tea I suppose. Which ever might work best. Thanks for the advice!

[@jodiekingsley5181]

Going. Try this. And love your dieing. How bout ling. Lasting in yarn still stay in the yarn happy Thanksgiving ronyiu and family

[@thomashubbell8612]

Is it possible to whiten wool that doesn’t start that way?

[@ChemKnitsTutorials]

No, not without damaging the fibers. This is why for dyeing we typically start with natural "bare" yarn vs bleached wool.

[@deborah5568]

Did the vinegar cause the yarn to grab the color quickly in the area where it was added? That was my thought. Oh btw did the odor of the onion come out of the yarn. You are doing such a great service doing these experiments. We never know what life will bring in the future, this may come in handy some day. Who knows, right? LoL God bless you, sweetie.

[@ChemKnitsTutorials]

I don't think the yarn smelled like soup any more after it had dried. I'm not sure if the vinegar is necessary - but it depends on the dye compound, to be honest. I'm not sure about the pigment molecules in onion skins to talk about the chemistry.

[@joancayenne9293]

Could you use onion skins to dye cotton?

[@ChemKnitsTutorials]

I think so, but I'm not sure if it does as well as it did on the wool.

[@feltedfeet9766]

Good job as always. I’m not sure if you mentioned in your video how to get even more colours from the one dyepot simply by changing the PH. There are many more colours you could have got if you would do this. Natural dyeing isn’t as straight forward as chemical/acid dyes and it is worth knowing how to do it. Maybe you could show us this.

[@ChemKnitsTutorials]

I'm not sure if the onions were pH sensistive. I do examine pH with my red cabbage kzbin.info/www/bejne/a6nYoHRroN5pjLM and black beans videos kzbin.info/www/bejne/b6e6oKytf6x6Z7s

[@michelroess2652]

I don't understand how you can heat yarn like that. I thought wool shrunk in hot water, could someone explain?

[@ChemKnitsTutorials]

Felting occurs with heat and agitation. If you put non-superwash wool in the washing machine, the tumbling from a front loader/ agitation from a top loader will cause the fibers to rub against one another and produce felting. It is best to keep the water below a boil so you don't have a lot of movement in the fibers. Some gentle movement is fine. I am MUCH more gentle with unspun roving than yarn since roving can felt much easier. I hope this helps!

[@WhimsicalThreadz]

very cool idea

[@ChemKnitsTutorials]

Thank you so much!

[@LoFIJak]

How was the colour fastness without the mordant?

[@ChemKnitsTutorials]

I think onions are fugative dyes anyway, so I'm not sure if a mordant will help or not. it could, but if the pigment degrades in sunlight a metal ion may or may not help with stability. It really depends on the colored molecule.

[@LoFIJak]

@@ChemKnitsTutorials Okee dokee. Thanks for letting me know!

[@ddhvn28]

Lol! My Korean friend actually boils the yellow onion skins like you did. But instead of using it as a dye, she drinks it for nutrients. Lol

[@ChemKnitsTutorials]

I actually bet it would be pretty good. Very broth-y.

[@charlottedowson2023]

Hey once you soak your yarn before hand do you pop them straight into dye ? Or do you let it dry 1st ? Many thanks

[@ChemKnitsTutorials]

I presoak the yarn so it is wet before adding it to the dye. If you add dry yarn to your dyepot you can get more tonal variation which can give awesome results. However, since I was comparing different fiber types all in one pot I wanted to give them a more equal chance at the color absorption if that makes sense.

[@jenniball1746]

Did the smell of onion impregnate the yarn

[@ChemKnitsTutorials]

Not really. it smelled a bit like I was making soup, though.

[@MissGroves]

Ooooo I'm confused about mordants, is there a tutorial on them for dummies? As I've been told that vinegar isn't one.

[@ChemKnitsTutorials]

I normally wouldn't call vinegar a mordant, but it is adding "something" to the pot. Most of what people refer to as mordants are metal salts which bind to the colored molecules from plants etc and then since they're charged can help these colors interact with yarn. It is possible that the yellow pigment might have a charge so it stuck really well, but this is just a hypothesis.

[@MissGroves]

@@ChemKnitsTutorials thank you, that makes sense to me.

[@katecham627]

M just concerned for the amount of water that is used

[@ChemKnitsTutorials]

Unfortunately a lot of dyeing techniques do involve a lot of washing and rinsing at the end. I try to reuse water where I can - I'll use presoak water for rinses and reuse dyebaths for a lot of different videos.

[@8ntfrogn]

How does the yarn not get tangled?

[@ChemKnitsTutorials]

Magic. ;) More seriously... Luck I suppose. I've been really lucky when it comes to tangles while dyeing yarn. I will try to always hold the yarn using my hand like a tie, especially while washing. I've gotten really good at ordering skeins while wet, too. I set a bad example by not adding more ties to my yarn. I highly recommend adding more ties if tangling is a concern. If your yarn does get tangled, wait until the yarn is dry to order the skein. It is a lot easier when things are sticking to themselves less.

[@maggiezorn4591]

You should dye with berries 😊😋

[@ChemKnitsTutorials]

I'd love to someday!

[@TarotLadyLissa]

Have you done beets or berries?

[@ChemKnitsTutorials]

I haven't done berries yet, but I have sort of done beets. I've used some natural food coloring powder where the pink is from beets and got some nice color. I've heard that beets can be a fugative dye - which means that it will dye the fabric but fade over time. I do love some beets so maybe I'll have to do some extraction and eat some yummy salads. Thanks for all of these suggestions!

[@CF-rl8mz]

Ugh... can’t believe I’ve been throwing my skins away all this time! Booooo 😑 Very cool experiment.

[@ChemKnitsTutorials]

I have an old screw top container that I now put all of the skins in. I'll leave them on a bowl for a few days to completely dry out (and avoid mold) before I add them.

[@vickirasmussen4791]

Funny she uses grams for the onions but cups for water why not liters

[@ChemKnitsTutorials]

This is a very fair question! I use cups/tsp/Tbsp etc while baking vs mL, and so these are the measurements I'm used to looking at. But I prefer to use g vs oz for weights... Thank you for pointing this out to me!

[@jodiekingsley5181]

Hmm whonder if you dye water melon skin of watermelon

[@ChemKnitsTutorials]

ooo I'm honestly not sure. Good suggestion!

[@maureengreen4008]

Question...can these (the dyes) sit in a container without going mouldy before you use them to dye wool? I guess I’m asking - how long can these be made ahead of time? I’m very interested in trying this because I’ve got a lot of naked yarn coming my way.

[@ChemKnitsTutorials]

I think that onion water would go bad at some point. BUT what I do is dry out the skins and then I store those for long periods of time. (I might be saving up more onion skins!)

[@jodiekingsley5181]

Going to nbn try this you put eny thing els

[@cheskydivision]

Did this for Easter eggs every year

[@ChemKnitsTutorials]

Ooo that would be fun on Easter.

[@ICanCraftThat1]

Your house must have been quite.... Fragrant

[@ChemKnitsTutorials]

It wasn't bad at all. It smelled like I was making chicken soup. :D

[@tinak.6378]

ChemKnits Tutorials did the smell wash out of the red onion yarn...? That would be the worst part for me. I hate the smell of onions.

[@ChemKnitsTutorials]

I don't think the yarn smelled like onion at the end at all.

[@kittylevee4662]

Have you used carrots❓ 🥕🥕🥕🥕🥕🥕🥕🥕🥕

[@ChemKnitsTutorials]

I haven't, and now I'm a bit curious. I saw this comment during my livestream and I'll have to look and see if people have done it.

[@kittylevee4662]

@@ChemKnitsTutorials I saw a film of a Navajo weaver years ago. She let the carrots get VERY old. Way past eating but not mouldy. Then she said that she boiled them. That's as far as the film went in to it...🤔

[@kittylevee4662]

@@ChemKnitsTutorials no refrigeration 😱

[@sandradearing604]

❤️🤟🐶

[@ChemKnitsTutorials]

Hint Hint... part 2 might be coming soon. ;) But I didn't say anything.

[@franmule747]

No no no. Do you have to wait for the water to cool. This yarn doesn’t do well in hot water. I’m halfway through I guess I can just watch the rest of it

[@ChemKnitsTutorials]

Wool fine can be fine in hot water as long as you don't move the yarn too much or shock it too quickly. A lot of natural pigments require heat to set tot he yarn, unfortunately.

[@jodiekingsley5181]

Wow lovely

[@queenreine8333]

M