bacterial colour workshop

By katefarley on 16/02/2024

For a number of years I've been aware of the fascinating work of Colorifix, an award winning bacterial dye biotech start-up organisation based in Norwich leading the way for a more sustainable dye practice. Following some planning and support from our technical team I was able to host PhD researcher Ruth Lloyd in partnership with Colorifix to share with us their work and to lead a workshop for our BA3 students. Ruth is carrying out practice-based research "to develop and commercialise bacterial dyes, where she will further explore the capacity of colour producing microorganisms to create human designed patterns".

We were treated to a insightful presentation by Ruth about the science and development of the colours, before we were able to have a go at printing with the bacterial dye colours. The students and staff tested painting the colour directly on to the fabric as well as painting on the screen then transferring the colour, as well as using paper stencils with the open screens.

The range of colours is limited at the moment, so this is something being worked on by Ruth and the team at Colorifix. The different fibre content of the fabrics printed on can significantly impact on how the colour appears so we were testing natural and synthetic fabrics to build our technical files and our own understanding of colour and textiles. Thanks Ruth and Colorifix!