“That’s one of the beauties of the natural dyes—they’re very very subtle and they’re homogeneous—they go with one another. It’s almost impossible to dye two colors that don’t go together, even if they’re in different color families.”
~Sharon Neill
History:
Although dyed with a now-faded red and green, these two contrasting colors do not clash. Natural dyes, used to create these colors, rarely conflict with each other visually. Instead, they coordinate because they are more muted than the chemical dyes we are familiar with today. Both red and green dyes are difficult to extract from the natural world, as most plants make a yellow or orange dye. The most common dye plant to produce red is madder, a non-native species from Europe. Greens were typically made by taking yarn dyed yellow and putting it in a blue dye pot, usually one of indigo. This process of “overdyeing” created shades of green by mixing the yellow and blue together, just like on a color wheel!
Description:
A woven coverlet patterned with blocks and squares. The warp is brown thread while the weft is green and red. The weft makes up woven pattern. The blanket is woven from wool threads. The selvage edges are left raw; ends are turned under. The blanket is made from three unequal woven portions that are seamed together on the reverse side.
