Like a sommelier’s sensitive palate distinguishes subtleties of fine wines, dye masters have an innate recognition of the color spectrum.

“I can’t sing, I can’t dance, but I can make and recognize color,” said dye master Linda LaBelle of Roanoke, who has traveled the globe learning and teaching natural dye techniques for two decades. “You might have 20 blues, and I can tell you which blue is which.”

While dye techniques and materials have evolved with civilization, an international community of dye masters still honor ancient methods, creating dyes from natural sources like roots, leaves, flowers, seeds, insects and wood.

Out of the blue

Botanicals like woad and Japanese indigo flourish in Virginia dye gardens. Indigos are tropical plants, but some varieties, like Japanese indigo, perform well in the state.

“It’s super versatile, and I think everybody should grow it,” LaBelle said. “And bees love indigo plants.”

A few raised beds in her backyard produce three indigo varieties from Central America, India and Japan, and woad—one of the oldest-known dye plants. Until the introduction of indigo from India in the late 1500s, woad was the only blue dye used in Europe.

Indigo vats meld into fermented organisms that must be fed, stirred and left to rest, and can live for years. LaBelle’s 55-gallon indigo vat is now entering its third year in her home studio. “It’s a living thing, and you treat it like a pet or a child,” she said. “Even when it’s resting, I still feed it sake. I keep stirring and checking to make sure it’s healthy. You never approach a vat when you’re angry or in a rush. Some days it’s not going to work; other days it works beautifully.”

The madder at hand

Red textile fragments dyed from roots of an old-world species of madder have been found in Pakistan from 2500 B.C., and in Egyptian tombs, according to U.S. Department of Agriculture ethnobotanists.

LaBelle sells the madder root whole, ground, and as extract through her online retail business called The Yarn Tree. Some customers want the plant matter, while others prefer extracts.

Small-batch fashion

Historically, certain colors were popular based on their availability, said fashion historian Dr. Dina Smith-Glaviana, assistant professor of fashion merchandising and design in Virginia Tech’s Department of Apparel, Housing and Resource Management.

“After the 1850s when synthetic dyes were introduced, the possible color range increased,” she said.

Smith-Glaviana said some dyes were harder to procure than others, like Tyrean purple dye produced from the glandular secretions of mollusks and discovered in 1500 B.C. It was expensive, as 12,000 mollusks were needed to produce 3.5 ounces of dye.

“Its scarcity is why it was used and restricted to royalty in Roman times and beyond,” Smith-Glaviana said. “People would put out yarns or fibers on a beach and wait for shellfish to wash up or crawl up on the beach and secrete on the fibers.”