Category: Coast Colours

Fibreshed goes to Fibre Camp 2017

The Sunshine Coast Spinners and Weavers Guild’s Fibre Camp 2017 was held at Camp Sunrise on the Sunshine Coast of BC from Sept 7th to Sept 9th. Fifty fibre enthusiasts gathered to attend workshops, played with their fibre, shopped at vendor stalls, talked, ate and shared their stories. The Sunshine Coast Fibreshed display featured local fleece dyed […]

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International Earth Day 2017

April 21, 2017, international Earth Day was celebrated in Roberts Creek, BC by our local Sunshine Coast Fibreshed. The day started out dry with sunshine, always windy at the pier. We set up our colourful Fibreshed display with locally dyed rovings, plants for a Dyers garden and local sheep fleece for garden mulch…. We featured […]

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Second Annual Fibreshed Day – Part 1

From Shepherdess to Knitted Dress The Second Annual Sunshine Coast Fibreshed Day was held April 9, 2017 at Fibreworks Studio and Gallery, Madeira Park, BC. The focus was on our local Shepherds & Shepherdesses to show off fibre from their sheep and the steps of shearing through to finished product. Wendy Gilbertson on her Wilson Creek farm with “Mojo”, […]

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Coast Colours – Horsetail

Horsetail (Equisetum sp.) is a living fossil.  Those of us who find it as an uninvited guest in our gardens can be thankful it doesn’t grow 30 metres high like some of its ancestors in the Paleozoic forests.  It’s also called scouring rush as the stems are coated with abrasive silicates and the plants were […]

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Coast Colours – Dandelion Flowers

Despised by many as pesky ‘weeds’, dandelions (Taraxacum officinale) have long been appreciated by herbalists for their valuable healing properties.  The 17th century herbalist Nicholas Culpepper proclaimed, “You see here what virtues this common herb hath, and that is the reason the French and Dutch so often eat them in the spring.”  And indeed, dandelion […]

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Coast Colours – Apple Bark

The apple (Malus domestica) was brought to North America in the 17th century by colonists.  At one time there were thousands of varieties of apples with greatly differing sizes, shapes, colours and markings.  There were early, midseason and late varieties for fresh eating, varieties for winter storage and others for baking, drying and cider.  Sadly, […]

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Coast Colours – Arbutus Bark

The beautiful arbutus tree (Arbutus menziesii) is one of the distinctive features of the Sunshine Coast.  Canada’s only native broadleaf evergreen grows in areas where the soil is rocky and drains rapidly and is often found along rocky shorelines.  It can also be found growing in residential areas.  The flowers, which open in April and […]

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Coast Colours – Alder Bark

The plants and mushrooms from our gardens and wild spaces on the Sunshine Coast offer us many beautiful colours for dyeing fabric and fibre.  This blog is the beginning of a series which will explore and document dyeing with local plants and mushrooms.  I hope that other local dyers will add their dyeing experiences. Alders […]

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