I seem to play with something everyday. Lately, when I dye fabric, I have been wishing to do something that is a bit more friendly to me. Many of the mordants are not people friendly. It is the stuff that helps dye set in fabric. I have been seeing people use soy milk. So I figured why not. Soybeans are fairly inexpensive and they compost. I may not like the smell but that is not a big deal.
I set a cup of soybeans to soak for a couple days. Put them in a blender with a bit of water. Blended for about 5 minutes. Strained the liquid off of them and added more water. I needed enough liquid to soak the fabric I wanted to use. This first time I heated the soy milk with the fabric in it. I decided that was a mistake. Soybean when heated can leave waxy spots.
Those are the dark spots on the fabrics. The cotton silk piece picked up more of the wax then 100% silk bits. Since this was a first pass, I am going to use this piece for me. I have some slips I need to make since I have ones falling apart. I am working with a hibiscus dye pot where I did not eat the soy milk and that seemed to make difference.
This dye pot was red cabbage and hibiscus. It seemed to make a grey with blue tones. The piece that I added iron to became a grey teal. They are very pretty. I have started to use the ribbons already.
I like this play. The ribbons I am making are really nice on my slips. More experiments to happen in the future.