I met with Bailey a few weeks ago to hear how she got started in her Eco-dying process and how the idea of creating hair scrunchies with natural dye immersed.
Bailey has been a resident of Revelstoke for a few years now and she loves everything this town has to offer, especially when it comes to sustainable living.
She is one creative gal and enjoys living simply off the land. I got to catch up with her in her tiny home to hear all about her business endeavor.
Perhaps the long days of covid brought the dream about, or working at the local food bank and seeing all the items that would generally go to waste be given new purpose; whatever the case Bailey is onto something and it’s such a fun and unique idea!!
She’s using items in the pantry to make dye for fabric, fashioning it into hair scrunchies and up-cycled t-shirts (made from pillow cases!!) She has some other ideas brewing, but you’ll have to follow along to see them as they hit her online shop.
How does she do it? Some of it will be left a mystery for the maker herself to share but let’s start at the beginning.
The question we pose to you is what do you do with your onion peels? Toss them in the bin right? Maybe feed them to the animals outdoors or dispose of them in the compost. Well, Bailey found a new use for them and after some online tutorials, lots of research, trial and error she has found a method she loves and is still tweaking it as she goes. The onions are boiled in a giant pot until the peels leave their ‘natural stain’ in the water. Her Mordant (what binds the colors to fabric) is made with soy milk & water, because who needs to spend an atrocious amount of money on something you can substitute so easily at the local market?
The fabric is bathed in the water with the mordant for hours, then hung to dry for up to a week to let it set in and hold the color.
Once the dye process was figured out then came the sewing, a few more tutorials and fine-tunes later, Bailey was ready to give it a go and the outcome are these adorable scrunchies!!
All are hand dyed with items such as onions and beets and there will be many more natural ingredients along the way to get all sorts of colors the rainbow holds!!!
Bailey looks forward to expanding her collection, and having her items in one of the local shops here in Revelstoke called Forage and Fill, an Eco-friendly, zero waste refill and repurpose store. Give her a follow on Instagram and make sure to stay tuned for all she will have to offer!!
