Mastering Mordants

Mordants are metal salts used as fixatives for attaching natural dyes to fiber. Your application of mordants and/or other fixatives directly determines both the quality and depth of your dye outcome, but also its permanence.

In this workshop we will cover everything mordanting! This includes prepping your fabric for dyeing, the importance of pH, fiber characteristics and structures, the chemistry and application of mordants/fixatives, metal mordants, mordant-accumulating plants, tannins, non-mordant fixatives, acid dye processes, dyeing assists, and various mordanting techniques including pre-mordanting, post-mordanting, middle mordanting, citric acid discharge, mordant printing/painting, and iron black applications. As we move through these processes we will also discuss the concept of mordanting within other techniques, such as planning process order in multi-step projects and mixing mordants with indigo resist techniques.

The course will provide students with a solid foundation for further natural dyeing. This class is completely hands-on. Students will create their own swatch cards for future reference as we move through each process as a group. There is plenty of space for personal experimentation, technique development and troubleshooting.