The Craft Dome at Garlinge Green Road, Chartham
CT4 5RU
Project - a community dye garden.
Site
The Craft Dome, CT4 5RU
Official beginning
30 March 2025
Team
(In progress)
To do list
Needed:
Set new seeds
Nurture the new plants
Pot out the larger plants
Develop the main small garden
Acquire more large planters
Madder, Weld and direct-dyeing Woad
What we’ve accomplished:
1.
Raised Weld plants - now in their second season and almost ready to use.
2.
We have been given some mature plants of Tansy - also ready for use, although these will probably be used to propagate more. It is prolific and grows readily in poor soil, but can become invasive.
3.
Raised Madder plants, now in year two, but these need at least three years to mature, so no local red dye yet! Additionally, we’ve found a splendid tall pot for them, so hopefully they will produce some nice long roots. Madder dye comes from the orange roots. They look like stringy carrots when freshly dug and washed.
4.
Raised some Woad plants. They are still very small and not happy! Here’s hoping the recent rain will improve things.
UPDATE:
Additionally, we are now experimenting with “poly roll wrapping'“. This uses less soil, but encloses the plants and soil with individual layers of bubble-wrap. This not only retains moisture, it encouages the roots to grow deep. This is particularly important with Woad, as it has a long tap root and does not do well if roots are stunted.