medieval butterflies

Order of the Silver Brooch for Mariette de Bretagne

woad 2017

A brief word about indigo containing plants first. In my studies I have learned that indigo blue can be isolated from at least three different plants: woad (Isatis tinctoria), "bagdad" indigo (Indigofera tinctoria), and Japanese Indigo (Persicaria tinctoria/Polygonum tinctorum). The first time I tried Indigofera tinctoria I only got two plants to germinate at all and they yielded no blue. The same year, 2015, I grew Isatis tinctoria and yielded a little success but only sufficient florey in my vat to paint out one circle of blue that I evidently didn't take pictures of. 2016 was the summer we moved. There were no extant gardens on the property and not enough energy to install them until 2017.

In 2017 I grew woad, Isatis tinctoria, in three large red planters in the front garden at the new house in Windham. I was more careful to feed the plants well in 2017. Two of the pots were only "50/50" mix from the garden center who said "It's really about 70/30 loam and Benson's. Any richer would burn your plants." And the third pot included amazing compost from an acquaintance of my mom who makes it with kitchen scraps and mess from his chicken coop.

Medieval Manuscript Garlic references 2017

The juice of hard necked garlic, Allium sativum, grown across the world in northern latitudes, may be used for all sorts of culinary applications as well as a gilding binder and more.

 Allium sativum scapes growing 2017

 

Read more by clicking through!

More Saffron yellow resources

From Booke of Secrets:

Another yellow

Mix saffron with the yolke of an eg, and it maketh a faire shining colour. Otherwise.
Put saffron and alum into a clout, and put vineger into it, and strain it out: or take saffron, the yolke of an eg, gum Arabike and alum, and mix them together.

And another from a translation of Simone's MS 1793 in the Getty's Historical Painting:

Wallert 1996

flax seed to linen?

In 2017 I grew flax seed. The easiest seed to find was in the bulk section of a local grocery store. I bought a few pounds of both organic brown and yellow varieties. I now know that food varieties will not make the longest fibers nor are they even the right specie. I also planted the seeds in a less than ideal configuration. Sometimes learning is done the hard way. I don't have any printed sources that talk about growing or processing linen and I was reticent to try to find any but those I could find online for free.

A better seed source would be Linum usitatissimum from the linked garden center or another reputable seller and planting should be done in a large garden (rather than strips) so it stands up against itself which may discourage branching.

Read more below for this crazy trial.

Calendula paint

and here it is under different lighting, click Read More please!

Calendula yellow

Calendula officinalis, pot marigold, is a beautiful little flower, sometimes called poor man's saffron.

I know one can make paint out of saffron, like I did here, so why not try Calendula?

 Read more about my Calendula experiment below!