4. Biofabricating Dyes and Materials#

Objectives#

from Fabricademy website:

Produce at least one natural dye or bacterial dye.
Produce at least one crafted or grown material.
Document the recipes and process and if there have been changes; name your materials, and display swatches systematically.
Submit some of your swatches to the analog material library of your lab. (20cm *20cm aprox).

A. Bacterial Dyeing#


Raw silk dyed with Serratia bacteria

Bacterial dyeing is a hot-button research topic.

Textile professionals and scientists are col-LAB-orating on bacterial dyeing. The race is on into how we can “scale up” bacterial dyeing to mass production.
- See Textile Lab Vienna for an example

Step 1: Bundle, fold, and tie fabric however you want and place in a petri dish#

Step 2: Sterilize petri dish#

Step 3: Add LB broth#

Step 4: Inoculate bacteria#

Step 5: Kill the bacteria#

9a4d269b-0b8a-407d-8d64-0881ad8a50b3 from Jenny Kleininger on Vimeo.

Step 6: Wash fabric#

B. Natural Dyeing#

Filaflex button molds with bioplastic buttons. Buttons are made of gelatin and naturally coloured with cabbage and soda ash

Fab Lab Barcelona experimented with natural dyes as a group. We made dyes from food waste including cabbage, hibiscus, red onion skins, fresh tumeric, roses, lemon.

We also made colour variants from adding chemicals like soda ash, iron, and vinegar to the natural dyes to produce different colour tones.

Inspiration for Colour Trio Dyes#

Of all colour swatches we produced, I was drawn to 3 specific dyes:
- bright yellow (produced by tumeric)
- jungle blue-green (produced by cabbage and soda ash)
- hot pink (produced by cabbage, onion skins, red rose petals, and lemon juice)

I made this my colour palette, and recorded these properties:
- pH
- ingredients
- characteristics


From left to right: fabric swatches dyed by tumeric, coral reef in Mauritius via Nowathome, roses, and colour samples from our experimental dyes at Fab Lab Bcn.

Colour Trio Results#

Classes of fibers:
- horse hair (animal fibers)
- cotton (plant fibers)
- pina (plant fibers)

Conclusions:
- Pina textile held the dye best out of all the fabric swatches
- Leave the dye in for one week before rinsing it out

Bioplastics#

Inspiration#


From left to right: Coco Chanel’s little black dress in Vogue (1926) ft. Galalith costume jewelry, sea foam via Diseno, Galilith samples via The Getty, cafe latte foam shot by me.

Next I applied my color palette to a design product and made buttons. The button mold was designed in Rhino, and fabricated by 3D printing. I made bioplastics in yellow, pink, and green. Additionally, I experimented with adding texture to my bioplastics by using foam. Buttons were made by pouring coloured bioplastic into the mold.


The original buttons (left) are inverted in order to make the mold (right). Designed in Rhino.


The first 3D printed mold did not work because the filaflex filament was old and not joining correctly (right).

Classes of bioplastics:
- Agar (plant product)
- Gelatin (animal product, specifically pig)
- Gelatin + foam (animal and vegetable)

Conclusions:
- Gelatin is the best bioplastic material for making buttons, thus far
- Gelatin shrinks a lot from the original size that is poured into the mold - Aesthetically, the foam effect doesn’t look so good on a button. The surface of the button is too small, or I need to find a way to make denser, smaller bubbles to achieve the desired effect.

Data Sheets#

Yellow (dye / bioplastic)
Instructions:
- Add 3 tbsp of ground tumeric to 100 mL of boiled water
- Mix well, until lumps disappear
- For bioplastic, mix the dye into 100 mL of gelatin mixture
- pH (dye) = 6.5
- special characteristics: cloudy, tumeric particluate tend to be present in bioplastic

Pink (dye / bioplastic)
Instructions:
- Add 100 mL of boiled water to 1 red rose petal, 100 g of purple cabbage, and 30 g of onion skins.
- Add 50 drops of fresh lemon juice
- For bioplastic, mix the dye into 100 mL of gelatin mixture
- pH (dye) = 2
- special characteristics: dye colour does not hold as well as the green or yellow.

Green (dye / bioplastic)
Instructions:
- Add 200 mL of boiled water to 130 g of purple cabbage.
- Add a pinch of soda ash
- For bioplastic, mix the dye into 100 mL of gelatin mixture
- pH (dye) = 8
- special characteristics: dye colour is affected by gelatin. It reverted from blue-green back to purple. I had to add more soda ash to stabilize the green colour I wanted.

Downloads#

C. Bundle Dyeing#


Cotton fabric after bundle dyeing with turmeric, black tea, leaves, and flower petals

Refer to Biofabricating Dyes 2018

Step 1: Prepare fabrics#

Step 2: Prepare mordant#

Step 3: Prepare bundle#

Step 4: Soak bundle in mordant#

Step 5: Rinse bundle#

D. Reflections on Biodyeing and Biomaterials#

Sustainability & Design Criteria#

[x] Produce at least one natural dye or bacterial dye. - bacterial dye
- natural dyes (primarily cabbage, lemon, soda ash, rose petals, and turmeric)
[x] Produce at least one crafted or grown material.
- gelatin bioplastics
- agar bioplastics

[x] Document the recipes and process and if there have been changes; name your materials, and display swatches systematically.

[ ] Submit some of your swatches to the analog material library of your lab. (20cm *20cm aprox)
- Most of Fab Lab BCN’s swatches turned moldly :(

How were the objectives accomplished?#

Learned the following new techniques:
- Bundle dyeing
- Bacterial dyeing
- Making gelatin and agar
- Introduced to 3D printing

Furthered my knowledge in:
- How to make a mold in Rhino
- Natural dyes and how they interact with fabrics - Documentation

Problems and challenges#

Lecture reflections#

“Biofabricating Dyes” and “Biofabricating Materials”
Presented by Cecilia Raspanti, Fabricademy Instructor
Lecture 4

“Biofabricating Dyes” highlights:

“Biofabricating Materials” highlights: