🍃 If you’re a craft and nature lover looking for your next obsession
🍃 And you want to deepen your relationship with the special dye plant Eucalyptus
🍃Plus you’d love to expand your natural dye knowledge in a systematic way, with skills that you can adapt to other dyestuff over time…
Welcome to the Eucalyptus Dye Journey
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In The Eucalyptus Dye Journey you’ll learn how to eco-print and naturally dye on wool and cotton and yarn and paper with eucalyptus leaves and bark and sawdust! Pick and choose your favourite topics, or try them all!
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When you embark on the Eucalyptus Dye Journey, you’ll get:
A library of foundational dye techniques, including how to wash and prepare fabric, and make your own mordants and binders, so that you can jump straight into getting great results. So many new dyers skip over this and end up wasting a lot of time and materials getting mediocre results, when a few simple tweaks could mean success straight away.
A complete introduction to the dye potential of eucalypts, including how to create dye baths from different parts of the eucalyptus tree, so you can branch out from just using leaves (because there are so many more colours to discover!)
The results of my tests of different variables. This includes my experiments into optimal cooking times for eco-prints and dye, so you can be confident you’re cooking your bundles and dye for just long enough, ensuring you get the richest possible results without wasting time and energy overcooking them.
A huge list of eucalyptus species I recommend dyeing with (so you don’t have to waste time testing each of the 900+ eucalypts!) PLUS my favourite way to avoid needing to learn species names, if you prefer to wing it.
Access to a private eco-print community where you can ask questions, show your results and connect with other eco-printers. Only available if you join us for the live round of this course.
Step-by-step video lessons for specific eco-printing and natural dyeing projects on cotton and wool and paper and yarn, so you can create this results of your dreams.
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So what kinds of projects will this course guide you in? There are many step-by-step videos of specific eco-print and dye projects including:
exciting ways to combine eco-print and shibori dyeing techniques, to create more complex results. This will elevate your natural dye projects into stunning art pieces.
a simple way to get orange eco-prints on paper! I’ve never taught this before 😍
a few different methods for dyeing variegated yarns, so you can craft the perfect yarn for your next knitting, weaving or crochet project, bringing a whole new level of handmade!
the trick to getting clear and detailed eco-prints on cotton, with crisp edges and stunning vein detail, for results that will make you gasp.
when to use fresh vs dried vs soaked leaves, so you can choose the right type for each project. This will help you get brighter, clearer results.
the secret to dyeing a large piece of wool fabric with a small handful of leaves, so you can get beautiful results even if you don’t have access to many eucalyptus trees.
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FAQs
What if I don’t have access to many/any eucalyptus trees?
While we will focus on this remarkable genus, you can absolutely join in with limited or no access to eucalyptus trees. I have lessons on how to make use of limited amounts of leaves as efficiently as possible, creative ways to track down leaves to use, and suggestions for alternative dyestuff to try for both eco-printing and natural dyeing.
Will I have access to the course materials beyond the 5 weeks?
Yes! You will have ongoing access to all the lessons and videos for many years. So if you want to come back to it later, no worries!
Purchases can be made with most major credit or debit cards using either Paypal or Stripe. Visa, Mastercard, American Express and the Discover Network are supported by both Paypal and Stripe. China UnionPay and JCB are only supported by Stripe. If you are unable to use Paypal or Stripe in your country, please contact me to discuss alternative payment methods.
There are beginner options for both ebooks and ecourses, while my ecourses also offer some advanced options. Some of the information crosses over both, but there is also unique information in both. So it really comes down to your personal preference. Perhaps you prefer learning through videos or through reading. Or perhaps you will enjoy supplementing the learning from one with the other.
At the top of the page, click ‘Log in’ and then ‘My courses’. Click on the course you want to begin, then choose any lesson to get started. To track your progress through each course, click the ‘complete’ button at the bottom of each lesson as you go.
After purchasing, you can download the ebook from my website straight away. You will also be emailed a download link. If you have trouble downloading on a phone, please try again on a tablet or desktop computer.
You can also find your ebook purchases in your profile dashboard after you log in – click the ‘ebook’ tab. If you ever lose your pdf, come here to re-download it.
The main processes or techniques are taught through video lessons. There are also written notes and photographs to supplement your learning. You can ask questions on each lesson and there is also email support if you need it.
It’s not secret that eucalyptus leaves are my favourite. But all of my ecourses also cover a range of other leaves from around the world, including maple, rose and blackberry. In the Intro to Cotton module, I also guide you in how to choose and test additional plants that might have eco-printing potential.
The content of the Intro to Cotton Living Colour module overlaps with this ebook and my workshops, although there is some new content too. All the other modules cover new techniques that I haven’t shared elsewhere. For example – different mordants and binders, dye blankets and iron blankets, additional ways to fold bundles, and methods of combining eco-printing and shibori techniques on both wool and cotton.
The Iso Dye Club has some overlap with my Plant Poetry ebook, but there is plenty of new content in there too.
If you want to learn how to eco-print on cotton, Gum Leaf Alchemy is definitely the one to start with. Although it focuses on eucalyptus leaves, it also gives step by step instructions for the entire process. The Leaf Guide has been written as a follow up guide which delves into each of the 25 leaves, but assumes this prior knowledge of the process.
Leaf and Colour is perfect if you want to combine eco-printing and natural dyeing techniques, or to use soy milk binder. And if you are looking to work with paper rather than fabric, check out Plant Poetry.
Besides the Spanish version of Gum Leaf Alchemy, I don’t have any other translations available yet, sorry! If you would like to use Google Translate, after purchase I can send you a special text document for this purpose.
Most of the plants covered are not Australian natives and I have intentionally chosen plants from different regions of the world. That said, there is a focus on those that grow in temperate climates.
Most of the method covered in Gum Leaf Alchemy also works on wool or silk. The main difference is that cotton needs mordanting while animal fibres don’t. You can still use a mordant on animal fibres if you want darker colours but go easy as too much iron mordant can damage them. Silk and wool also need longer cooking times than cotton, of about 2 hours. Finally, fresh leaves are often better for wool and silk, whereas I often soak my leaves when dyeing on cotton. If you are interested in eco-printing on wool, check out my ‘Wool and Shibori’ ecourse.
