Dyeing with Sloes

You may have noticed the hedgerows are laden this year with some beautiful bright blue berries, these are sloe berries produced by blackthorn bushes. Whilst traditionally used for making sloe gin and jams or jellies, they also make a beautiful colour for natural dyeing!

You will need - 

• Large tub or bowl of sloes (the more dyeing you hope to do - the more you will need!)
• Cooking pot
• Spoon for stirring
• Cooking Tripod
• Campfire & fuel 
• Water
• Sieve
• 2 large bowls or buckets
• Water
• Your choice of things to dye: we used cotton cloth and clothing. You can also use wool or paper.
  

How to do it - 

1. Tip your sloes into the cooking pot, pour water over until they are well covered, you want round 2/3cm depth of water on top of the sloes (remember you can always add more water later).
2. Light your campfire.
3. Once the fire is established hang your cooking pot over the flames (ensuring it is not too low that is touching the wood underneath).
   
4. Bring the sloe mixture to a gentle simmer and stir frequently to ensure the berries don't begin to burn on the bottom of the pan. 
5. Allow the berries to simmer for around 45 minutes, continuing to stir and prod the
   berries occasionally to help them break down. You only want it to be cooking at a gentle simmer, if the mixture is boiling or bubbling vigorously adjust the height of your cooking pot using the tripod chain to lift it further away from the heat.
   
6. Once the berries have broken down and the mixture has become a lovely shade of pink, remove your cooking pot from the heat and set aside to cool. if the mixture is very thick after simmering consider adding some additional water at this stage.
7. Once the mixture has cooled, strain it through the sieve over a bowl or tub.
   
8. Dip your fabric into the colour mixture and allow to sit (this doesn't take long, our cotton only soaked for around 5 minutes and was very vibrant!)
9. Squeeze out the dye mixture and rinse the items in a bucket of cold clean water or under a tap to remove any excess.
   
10. Hang and allow to dry!

Tips & common questions - 

Do I need a fixative?
A fixative is sometimes used during the dyeing process to help the colour 'fix' to the fabric. We found one was not needed when using cotton, as the sloes naturally have a very strong colouring. However if you are dyeing wool or clothing that is going to be worn it would be worth considering adding a fixative. For berries you can use salt, we would recommend one quarter cup of salt for every 4 cups of dye mixture. Add this to the mixture after straining the pulp out and return to simmer gently for around an hour with your items in the cooking pot. After this rinse your fabric or wool and dry as normal.

Where can I find sloes?
Sloes are the fruit of blackthorn bushes, commonly found in the UK in hedgerows. They appear first in early autumn but are traditionally used following the first frost, which splits their skins. They have very distinctive long thorns making them fairly easy to identify, be careful of these when you're picking the berries though!

Can they produce a deeper blue colour?
You can experiment with peeling the skins from the sloes after a short time of simmering. Although a fairly fiddly process, the skins will produce a deeper colour when boiled alone without the flesh of the berries.

Don't throw away the leftovers!
The leftover pulp can be mashed down to make a lovely natural paint - or boil it up again with some added water to make more dye! 

Looking for a campfire cooking set up?  Check out our outdoor cooking set here which contains everything you need, including the tripod and lovely large enamel cooking pot.
The individual items are also available separately.

We'd love to see your dyeing creations! 
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