Buddleia - A Yellow Dye

As the days grow longer and the plants mature, the butterflies are fluttering around. the flowers start to come out. Flowers are really fun to work with as they can give many colours, and not always the colour you expect. Buddleia is a great example of this as all the flowers, regardess of the colour of the petals, all give a yellow dye. This is one of our best wild sources of yellow in the UK. As the buddleia is so abundant on wasteland and industrial edges, no-one minds you picking the flowers, and there are always so many that there are plenty to share wth the butterflies and bees. As you pick the flowers, a bright yellow colour starts to spread across your hands. This dye is fantastic to bundle dye with because the colour releases quickly from the flowers. You can also make a stong yellow dye quite quickly with just a few flowers. Sometimes when running workshops in London, I will pick the flowers at the train station on the way to the workshop venue.

You can dry the flowers to store the colour for using throughout the year. I find that it is important to dry the flowers quickly so that they don’t lose their colour. It they turn grown when drying, the colour won’t be as potent.