Trees & Metals: Mordants & Modifiers (2 in a 4-part series)

Trees & Metals: Mordants & Modifiers

Part 2 in a series of 4 evening Colour Lab workshops

Learn how to obtain rich colours from trees and scrap metals, for making watercolour inks and modifying your colour range.

In this workshop, you'll receive an introduction to the longer extraction methods used for making colour from trees (oak, alder & hawthorn) and metals (iron & copper). You'll learn how to make the infamous oak gall ink, used across centuries in literature and historical documents, as well as recipes for making metal mordants, to fix and modify your colours.

This is a great workshop for the depths of winter, when leaves and flowers are scarce but galls, cones, nuts and seeds are abundant and ripe for ink making!

You'll go home with: your own pot of tree-based ink, a set of colour sample cards, a starter kit for making metal modifiers & inks at home, and any drawings you've made.

Open to anyone aged 18+, no previous experience required. Materials and refreshments provided.

This workshop is Part 2 in a series of 4 evening Colour Lab workshops, running the second Wednesday of each month, November–February, 6-8:30pm, at School Farm, Totnes.

You can come to any of the sessions as a stand-alone workshop or join all 4 for a full course in learning how to make inks, paints, pigments & paper dyes from plants, minerals & waste products.

Full programme:

1. Flowers & Food: Ink Making & Instant Colour, Wednesday 11th November
2. Trees & Metals: Mordants & Modifiers, Wednesday 9th December
3. Paper & Prints: Paper dyeing & Eco-printing, Wednesday 13th January
4. Earth & Minerals: Pigments & Paints, Wednesday 10th February

£45 per workshop / £160 for all 4 (select the ‘All 4’ ticket on purchase)