I have been searching high and low for inexpensive pink and lavender dish towels and came to the conclusion that such a thing does not exist. So I decided to remedy this by purchasing plain white flour-sack towels and dying them myself. I did not want to use harsh dyes and looked to a more natural method - tea staining.
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| begin with inexpensive 100% cotton flour-sack towels |
When you think about tea staining, shades of brown and tan most likely come to mind. That is your traditional tea staining approach that uses some form of black tea, like Orange Pekoe. I decided to take a non-traditional approach and use an herbal blend to capture pink hues. It was (mostly) a success.
What You Will Need:
- 100% cotton flour-sack towels (I bought a 12 pack) you may wash them ahead of time, but do not use fabric softener on them as it interferes with the staining process
- 1 box of Tazo Passion Tea
- distilled white vinegar
- latex gloves (optional, but recommended)
Step 1: Tea Preparation
Fill up a stainless steel stock pot to about its halfway point. The less water, the more concentrated the tea will be, and the more vibrant the color. Add the teabags (cut off the tags and strings first - it is less messy that way) to the water and bring to a boil. Let steep for about 15 minutes, then remove the teabags with tongs. Add about 1/4 C. of the white vinegar to the tea (it will help the color grab and set on the fabric). Let the tea cool to room temperature.
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| After the water boils, let the tea bags steep for about 15 minutes |
Step 2: Staining the Towels
When the tea is cool enough that you can put your hands in without being burned, you are ready for the next step. Dampen the towels (they can be wet, but wring them out as best you can...you don't want them sopping or it will dilute the tea) and submerge in the tea. Let them soak for about 1 hour.
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| Let the dampened towels soak in the tea for about an hour |
Step 3: Cold Vinegar Rinse
When the towels have soaked for at least an hour, you can prepare your cold vinegar rinse. Fill a large bowl with cold water (I even threw in a few ice cubes for good measure) and about 1 Tbsp of the distilled white vinegar per quart of water. Remove the towels, one at a time from the tea, and wring out well (this is where the latex gloves come in handy). Place the towels 1-2 at a time in the cold vinegar rinse and allow to soak for about a minute, then wring out well. Fold towels in half, then put aside until your entire batch is colored to your liking.
You will notice the cold water will become pinker with each rinse. After a few, feel free to dump the dirty water and refill with fresh cold water and vinegar. And yes, this step may seem like overkill on the vinegar, but after trial and error, this procedure seemed to work best...
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| Place stained towels in a solution of very cold water and vinegar to help the color permanently set |
Step 4: Drying
When your towels are done, put them in your dryer. This will allow your color to set. I did not do this my first time around (nor did I add the vinegar to the tea) and the color washed away, even on just a rinse cycle. Instead of shades of pink, I was left with a light blue that was barely distinguishable from the original white.
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| Take your pile of damp pink towels and put them in the dryer to help the color permanently set |
Color Variations:
I did not want to have 12 hot pink towels, so I broke up the 12 into four sets of 3. Then the experimentation began. Even though I played with the color on step 1, the rest of the procedures stayed the same. Here is what I did in Step 1 to get the following color variants:
- light pink: dilute the tea with about 3-4 cups of water
- darker purple: add about 8-12 drops of blue food dye into your tea (okay, this might be cheating a little bit, but I wanted lilac and lavender colored towels, too!)
- lavender: dilute the darker purple color with 2-3 cups of water
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| To get a light pink, dilute the tea with water - I did this in my sink (and yes, I had to bleach my sink afterward) |
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| Add a little blue food dye to make shades of purple |
Breaking with tradition and experimenting with non-traditional methods can be rewarding. Now that I have the hang of the pinks and purples, I will probably do more along with some traditional tea stained towels and tie with a little jute rope or ribbon to give as Christmas gifts. In the end, I spent about $1.50 per towel - and they turned out quite pretty, if I do say so myself.
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