I truly enjoyed teaching Katazome (rice paste resist with natural dyes and pigments) class this summer. It was intense; all students worked early morning till late night. Luckily the weather was sunny and warm. Natural dyes need such kind of weather. We used traditional Japanese fabric stretchers (shinshi and harite). We started to cut stencil paper with knife. Cook rice paste and spread out through stencil on fabric. After drying the rice paste, paint. We used fabric paints first, then sumi ink and natural mineral pigments from Japan. Finally, applied natural dyes, such as madder root and cutch with alum and iron mordents. We also used natural indigo making a dye vat. Wish we could have much time to combine indigo and other natural dyes. It creates beautiful shades. Well,,,next time.
