natural dyes, sachio yoshioka, traditional dyes

‘In Search of Forgotten Colors’: A Documentary About the Beauty of Natural Dyes

In Search of Forgotten Colors is one of Japan’s national broadcaster NHK’s four short documentaries exploring Sachio Yoshioka’s work on natural dyes. Yoshioka is the fifth-generation head of the Somenotsukasa Yoshioka dye workshop in Fushimi. Yoshioka and natural dyes In 1988, Yoshioka took over his family business and immediately stopped using synthetic colors and moved ...

Jessica Kneipp

Sachio Yoshioka examining dyed material.

How-to: Dyeing Your Clothes the Natural Way

There is a growing trend of people opting to dye their clothes using natural, plant-based dyes. Not only does dyeing your clothes the natural way provide natural-looking colors for the fabric, but the process also ensures that no harmful chemicals are used. While this may be a labor-intensive process, natural dyeing is highly recommended if ...

Raven Montmorency

Piles of dyed material.

Study Shows Natural Dyes Used to Color Clothing Thousands of Years Ago

Even thousands of years ago people wore clothing with colorful patterns made from plant- and animal-based dyes. Chemists from Martin Luther University Halle-Wittenberg (MLU) have created new analytical methods to examine textiles from China and Peru that are several thousand years old. In the scientific journal Scientific Reports, they describe their new method, which can ...

Troy Oakes

Natural material with natural dyes.