Plants to dye for

As originally published on BU News Service Science on Oct 24, 2013.

By XiaoZhi Lim
BU News Service

Over the summer, I came across natural dyeing and a group of people who were doing it in Brooklyn, New York. It ended up being a video story for my internship at Bytesize Science, American Chemical Society, and The Chemistry of Natural Dyeing just came out this Monday. Watch the video below:

Definitely a must-try, do-it-yourself fun project. In fact, food waste items like yellow onion skins are also suitable for natural dyeing. You could also dye other things: my mum dyes her hair with beets. Here’s a link for a list of plants to use and some extra tips, like adding color fixatives and timing the soak. Have fun experimenting!