Ancient Red Dyes

Shirt dyed with red cabbage pigment & lemon juice dyeing agent, exploring ancient red dye sources

Back of Shirt Text

This shirt was colored with natural dyes. However, most of your clothing is made from synthetic dyes, which have major negative consequences to the earth and its inhabitants

For 5000 years, humans have used plant roots like chay root and madder to dye garments red. Insects of the Coccideae family can even be used too. These resources don’t contain toxic chemicals, and dyeing with them can require less water than dyeing with synthetic dyes

It’s time to return to roots - support natural dyes over synthetic dyes