Spin-Off – September 2019

Fall 2019 • Spin Off 71

The Colors of Buckthorn

Most of my dyeing has been done with glossy buckthorn

because there is so much of it near my house. I’ve been

able to get four distinct colors from buckthorn and lots

of shades within each of those colors on wool. The colors

are yellow, green, pinkish-red, and blue. All of the colors

have proven to be washfast and relatively lightfast. I have

several garments dyed with buckthorn, and most colors

do not show evidence of fading. However, I do have one

sweater that exhibited noticeable fading after being left

in my solarium for a week.

Yellow

Yellow is probably the easiest of all the colors to dye. You

can get yellow from the green leaves, green berries, or

bark. It’s as easy as collecting a bunch of leaves, throwing

them in a pot of boiling water, and adding yarn or fiber

mordanted with alum. The leaves produce a very clear

bright yellow. The more leaves you use in the dyepot,

the more intense the yellow produced. In my experience,

A Bit of Buckthorn History

Although common and glossy

buckthorns are considered

invasive plants in North America,

in Europe and parts of Asia, they

are native plants and have long

historical use. In researching buck-

thorn dyes, I found that buckthorn

berries were commonly used for

making lake pigments used for

paint or ink. Krista Vajanto’s scien-

tifi c research on Iron Age archae-

ological samples from Finland has

shown evidence of the presence

of buckthorn-bark dyes giving red

color. Subsequent articles show

that buckthorn-bark dyes actual-

ly make the yarn stronger than un-

dyed yarn (see Resources).

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Glossy buckthorn (Rhamnus

frangula) is a large deciduous shrub

that has glossy leaves, no thorns,

splotchy bark, and berries that turn

from green to red to blue-black. It is

native to Europe, Asia, and Northern

Africa, but is considered an invasive

plant in North America.

Common buckthorn (Rhamnus

cathartica) is a small deciduous tree

with leaves with toothed edges, long

thorns, and black berries. Unlike the

glossy buckthorn, common buckthorn

berries change from green to black

with no red stage in between and all

ripen at the same time. The bark,

when peeled from the tree, is orange.

I had been removing glossy buckthorn from my yard long

before I discovered its hidden potential as a dyestuff.

green berries have yielded more of a butterscotch color.

I have not tried dyeing with bark and water (without

other reagents), but I have read that a yellow can be

produced that way as well.

Yellows from buckthorn leaves on wool.