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Other articles in Home & Family > Gardening
How to Grow Indoor Plants 28 February 2009
| How to Create Your Own Dyer's Garden for Crafts |
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| Home & Family > Gardening |
| Written by Fresian2009 |
| Wednesday, 18 February 2009 19:05 |
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A dyer’s garden is so much fun and exciting to grow! You can virtually grow your dyer’s garden year round, depending on the area that you live in. The goal of a dyer’s garden is to select gardening plants that can then be used later to dye fabrics. This is great for dying fabrics for quilting, tie-dye clothing or just for fun projects with the kids. A dyer’s garden is something that even a beginning gardener can do.
Understanding the Purpose of a Dyer’s Garden
Let’s talk about the purpose of a dyer’s garden. Ideally, you want to find plants that will do well for dying fabric. Simple enough. You can gather these throughout out the year. You’ll need to pre-plan some of your projects to make it easier for planning your dyer’s garden. So take the time to stop and think about it all before you dive into the gardening project.
Ask yourself a few questions. Are you going to do large amounts of fabrics? Do you want just specific colors? Will it just be a fun gardening and craft activity for the kids? Answering these questions will help you setting up and planning your dyer’s garden.
Select a Location for your Dyer’s Garden
Now that you’ve answered some of the basic questions, it’s time to move onto selecting the ideal location for your dyer’s garden. The first thing to consider is the size. Do you need a large area for lots of different plants or a small one for just a fun kids’ gardening project?
You will also need to think about the types of plants that you will have in the dyer’s garden. Different plants have different light, soil and moisture requirements. Make sure that your ideal location for this gardening project is going to be a spot that all your new plants will love.
Plant Your Dyer’s Garden
The final step is to purchase seeds or seedlings to put in your dyer’s garden. For example, Madder roots are great to dye clothing or fabric red. Blackberries will make a rich purple stain. Marigolds are wonderful for brown. You can even do Indigo for a rich blue color. If you like greens, you will want lily of the valley and rhododendron.
You can plant several dyer’s gardens to have the optimum use of the plants. For example, you can plant several rhododendrons around your yard and use the flowers for green dye. Or you can have a couple of trees that drop acorns to use for dark brown dyes. It’s completely up to you how you want to approach the gardening techniques and set up your dyer’s garden to enjoy year round for fabric dying. |
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