Ammonia vs. Vinegar vs. Alum & Vinegar

Our kids had produced a impressive pile of beautifully dyed fabric...

...however the experiment wasn't over.

Instead of another duel between dyes, what if we compared the results of different mordants and modifiers?

I wandered around the house, pilfered through the cupboards and found ammonia (an alkali modifier) and vinegar (an acid modifier). Since, modifiers aren't as strong as mordants but have the potential to dramatically change the color of the dye bath, I was interested to see what would happen.

I chopped and boiled more of the wretched cabbage for the dye. The entire house stank for days.

The first one up was vinegar:

And check out what happened when it was added to the dye bath:

(Cabbage dye without vinegar modifier on left; cabbage dye with vinegar modifier on right)

Whoa! It turned the dye bright fuchsia!

The second one up was ammonia:

And when added to the dye bath...

(Cabbage dye without ammonia modifier on left; cabbage dye with ammonia modifier on right)

Whoa! It turned the dye green. This was so cool!

(And let's be very honest about ammonia. Yes, it was used as a dye modifier way back in the 1700's--in the form of old urine. In today's modern world, no donors were needed. Thankfully.)

The final one up was a combination of alum and vinegar. I was interested to see what a mordant + modifier duo could achieve:

(Cabbage dye without mordant/modifier on left; cabbage dye with mordant/modifier on right)

The dye bath wasn't so impressive, however, it was guaranteed to pack a powerful punch. 

I selected three previously dyed fabrics that needed some sprucing up and three white sheet remnants to be used as a benchmark. Into the dye pots they went:

(Vinegar dye pot)

(Ammonia dye pot)

(Alum mordant + vinegar modifier dye pot)

After an hour of simmering, the lids were placed on the pots (the ammonia pot was put outside because it curled nose hairs), and the dyes were left to work their magic...

Yellow & Red Beet Results

Drumroll...

What a let-down! The beet dyes hardly took to the fabric.

The yellow beets (left) only dulled the white fabric and the red beets (right) look like the color of a band-aid.

Waaaahhh!

Yellow Beets vs. Red Beets

This was my most anticipated duel. After all, the previous colors were surprisingly vibrant, and beets are very effective at staining kitchen counters and wooden utensils. I was dying (dyeing?) to see what would happen.

A secondary duel took place on the cutting board--those beets were tough! The only kind of red I wanted to see was beet juice, so I opted for some knife safety and finished the chopping myself.

The kids chatted while the pots filled with water:

And an hour later after simmering the beets, the dyes looked similar to the onion skins. But would they have a similar outcome?

(red beets on the left, yellow beets on the right)

Enter two other kids for the mordant:

And the entire party for boiling the fabric:

Both dye pots looked very unappealing--one like the contents inside a toilet and the other like a freakish accident--but recalling all the lessons learned from this process, looks can be quite deceiving.

And all that was left to do was sit and wait.

Red & Yellow Onion Skin Results

(Red onion skin on the left and yellow onion skin on the right)

Yes, the red onion skin dyed the fabric green! Here's a better picture of the color:

What in the world???

Red Onion Skins vs. Yellow Onion Skins

For our third round of dyes, we chose to observe a duel between red and yellow onion skins.

While very fun, this didn't go down without some tears.

Introducing the dyes (yellow onion skins on the left, red onion skins on the right):

Add the alum mordant...

And then stir the fabric...

And wait to see what happens overnight.

(yellow onion dye pot)

(red onion dye pot)

Coffee & Tea Results

Can you guess which fabric is the coffee and which fabric is the tea?

If you think the coffee fabric is on the left, you would be wrong!

That's right, tea is on the left and coffee is on the right.

Perhaps we didn't give coffee a fighting chance. After all, we dyed the fabric with already-brewed coffee. Hmm...

Coffee vs. Tea

The turmeric and cabbage were good experimental dyes. I learned a lot. Now this dye game needed to be ratcheted up.

What's more fun than a duel between two similar dyes?

This group of kids was tasked with coffee and tea. Starbucks graciously donated their used coffee grounds for our experiment, but--holy smokes!!!--we had no idea about the size of the bounty!

The kids had fun dragging and carrying their haul to the car.

Once home, we set to work. It was a match between generic black tea...

...and high-end coffee (a coffee so rich and creamy, so warm and inviting, I would frequently pause to inhale that delicious, robust smell--unlike the wretched cabbage from the day before).

Coffee on the left, tea on the right:

Add the alum mordant...

... and then the fabric...

...and wait overnight to see the results.