Thing 20. Hand-Spun Naturally Coloured Cotton
Today I finally spun some of my homegrown, naturally coloured cotton. Here’s a picture of the raw cotton. Yes, it really is chipmunk brown. I gin it (remove the seeds) at boring meetings at work. I love naturally coloured cotton and I grew a few plants in pots almost every year, alternating green or brown strains. It’s really cool stuff, because the colour doesn’t fade with sun or age. But you do have to be careful not to grow it near white cotton, to eliminate cross-pollination. For more info, see www.vreseis.com (my cotton isn’t FoxFibre, BTW).
Cotton rolag with hand carder (it’s a wool carder because I don’t own cotton carders:
Spun on a tahkli (Indian supported spindle). I did this during breaks at work. It’s a bit slubby because it wasn’t carded commercially:
Skein wound off on a niddy noddy:
Setting the twist. The twist of cotton has to be set with heat and moisture. I added a tsp. of baking soda because the colour deepens in an alkali solution.
Drying the skein. The weight of the cup is necessary to help set the twist:
If all goes well, I hope to make something with this skein and post it tomorrow.
Last 5 posts by spindexr
- Thing 29. Homage to Georgia O'Keeffe - March 2nd, 2008
- Thing 28. Calatrava Bridge aka Bridge of Strings, Gateway of Jerusalem - February 28th, 2008
- Thing 27. Crocheted Snack - February 27th, 2008
- Thing 26. My first Teneriffe lace medallion - February 26th, 2008
- Thing 25. First attempt at Romanian Point lace - February 25th, 2008