I was going to try some new dyestuffs, so I tried this Indian madder, manjistha (Rubia cordifolia). I had dry roots bought from a herb store, used a usual recipe for madder-like things: soaked for a while (about a day), added some calcium, then simmered for a few hours, then left for a while still, then strained, added alum and tried dyeing. After a few long (multiple hour) dyeing sessions, in-between which I let the egg dry out, here is what I got. It’s a bit more orange that a brown egg would be. It took very slowly, and the shade it not very deep.
It’s possible that I messed up something with the recipe, perhaps I should have chopped the roots up to make them finer (I’ve seen that recommendation somewhere). Manjistha is supposed to be less afraid of heat than regular madder (the main dyeing component, manjisthin, is present in madder too, but in a much smaller proportion), so I don’t thing that I overheated it. I used distilled water this time, who knows, maybe manjistha doesn’t like that. I din’t like the smell very much from the beginning, and after a few days the dye has started fermenting, so I ditched it. I dryed out the used roots and kept them in case I want to use them again – this is recommended with roots in general. Still have half of the original amount of unused roots, but probably won’t try it again any time soon – too much effort for a result that is too weak.
Here is what this egg looks like after writing (second dark red dye – sappan wood, and then vinegar etch):
Anyway, one more thing was tried.
It turned out much more orange than I expected – the extract never gave me orange like this, only gold, but then, I never cooked the extract, just added boiling water to it. It might be worth experimenting with not cooking the fresh flowers also, just steeping in boiling hot water, and seeing whether the color is different. Unfortunately, I probably won’t get a chance to try it this year, but maybe someone else will :). Now, the recipe: 
The useful thing in the book is the lists of plants by color, however, nowhere does it mention the light-fastness, so I am already sceptical. Here is a sample of the plant page:
And here are the lists by color: 
You know, that sappan wood I keep talking about, that gives the red or pink, or orange after yellow color? I’m running out of my supply, and so I looked around some more in case I won’t find anyone to bring me some from India. Since it is used in Traditional Chinese Medicine (Chinese name is Su Mu), I googled and then e-mailed the main Chinese herb stores and clinics in Toronto, asking if they had any.
Sappan wood (Ceasalpinia sappan) has become my favourite source of red color for now. Native to Asia, it is the “older” cousin of what is now known as Brazil wood. When the Portuguese invaded what is now Brazil in 1500, the redwood trees they saw growing there reminded them of Sappan wood, which they already knew, called it pau-brasil and used for dyeing along with the rest of the Europe. Because of extensive use for dye and for violin bows, or perhaps the opposite, because the dye business was not economically profitable after the invention of the chemical dyes, or maybe due to both these reasons, the Brazil wood (Ceasalpinia echinata, Paubrasilia echinata) is almost extinct now, Wikipedia says that the trade of Brazilwood is likely to be banned in the immediate future. So now we are back to the good old Sappan wood, which is still available and abundant in India and China. It is used medicinally in both Ayurveda (where it’s called Pathimukham) and in Traditional Chinese medicine (where it’s called Su Mu). 
I was checking out some books in the library, to see whether I am going to buy them or not, and stumbled upon this one, which I won’t get, but it might be of interest to someone else. There is a fairly good collection of books on natural dyes in the library at the Royal Ontario Museum (and here I didn’t even know they had a library!), so this is where I went on a book scouting trip last week.
They teamed up and tested all the recipes that are provided (on textiles, of course). What is nice about this book is that every recipe comes with a sketch of the plant. Here is bloodroot, one of the traditional East coast North American plants that is supposed to give colors within the red range (hence the name if the plant):
I tried raspberry shoots, because I had access to them, and they were listed in books. Standard recipe for raw leaves, collect as many as you can, soak overnight, boil for 15-20 min, let cool, strain, add mordant and dye. The left one with alum, the right one with iron. First shade after 20 min, second after an hour, third overnight. I was not very impressed with the result, but still it’s not nothing.
I would pick chestnut over raspberry any day, and yet if you don’t have one, and do have the other, you might want to give it a try. It can give you a decent yellow with alum after a couple of hours, or if you’re after aged look with that grey with iron, that could also be interesting, especially in combination with other colors.
Made this egg few weeks ago, when sappan wood dye was still fresh. Brown chicken egg, etched with vinegar, then sappan wood. Inspired by Natalie Kit and her brown eggs that I saw at Pysanky Toronto.