It was really quite interesting. One of the things she spoke about was a technique she calls hapa zome- "essentially a "kitchen Japanese" phrase meaning leaf dye "
It seemed quite simple, so today, I gave it a try!
All you really need is:
a block of wood,
a piece of paper (I used a section of brown paper bag),
some leaves and flowers gathered from outside,
some fabric (I used muslin- no silk available!),
and
a big hammer!
*Place your fabric on the wood block.
**Place your leaves/flowers on the fabric. I did them one at a time- the paper tends to slide a bit when hammering.
***Place the paper over the leaf
****Hammer it to a pulp!!
I tried cedar with berries, it smells great - but really doesn't leave the best imprint. I picked some wildflowers, lavender, lavender blossoms, sunflower leaves, clover, hyacinth bean flowers and pods, kale, spinach, broccoli leaf, foxtail, strawberry leaves, and quite a few others. Some just left a green blob, some left a nice print.
India says the colors will set with a steam iron. She used this technique on a 6m x6m floor cloth for a theatre, and several years later, the colors are still set, even with folks walking on it!
My muslin square just happened to fit perfectly on a vintage "ventilator" I picked up at a yard sale last week, for $1 !!!
This was a square cut in an old log cabin, with a piece of screen over it, for ventilation in a kitchen. Pretty cool piece of wood- I laid the muslin on top of it to get a photo and it fits!!
This was just a practice piece, but I will steam iron it, and then figure out what to do with it!! Now, on to the woods, for more leaves and stuff to hammer into fabric....................................hapa zome!!!!
