I love trying new things with fabric! I am always looking for new ways of making marks on fabrics, and lately I'm looking into more natural ways of doing that. As I mentioned in this post, I wanted to try something called Eco-printing: using leaves and plants arranged on fabrics and heated to leave an impression of the leaf material printed on the fabric. I love the faint, muted and natural tones of these types of prints. Mine did not turn out as vivid as I would have liked, but it was my first attempt, so I was open to whatever I came out with. Here are a few images showing my method and the resulting fabric.
Wet leaves from the backyard and an onion peeled with skins. The skins make the pretty rust color on the prints.
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Leaves and onion laid out ready. Lower scarf is silk, upper one is rayon. Both soaked in detergent as "mordant" to make the color stay.
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All bundled up and ready for the pot.
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Steamed these for one hour and then left them alone for three l-o-n-g days. The suspense nearly killed me.
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Unwrapping was like Christmas morning.
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Scarves side by side. The silk (on right) made much clearer, sharper impressions.
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This is the final silk scarf. I love the colors and natural impressions left behind. The natural fibers definitely took to the technique better I'd say. | 
The rayon scarf. The colors and impression is more faint, but still a pleasing look. I will likely re-print this one and see if I can improve the results. |
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