I bought some great Canadian wool from the Mineville Project series, 600 grams of the superwash Aran weight wool in the colour called Goldenrod, for a baby blanket.

I ordered it online and was hoping for something closer to a clean bright yellow, but it was very Chartreuse. Not the best colour if I’m honest. Canary  or buttercup, yes. Mustard-ish, no. I decided to source different wool for the blanket. I found more Mineville Project yarn, this time in the DK weight, and in person, at the Wool’n’Tart in Wolfville. Much better, but I can’t share the results just yet!

In the meantime I was left with a garment quantity of gorgeous wool that makes me look jaundiced.  Thank goodness for the wonders of dye. I considered either grey or red. Grey could have given some interesting and more neutral results over top of the gold, but decided on the red and hoped for shades of rusted iron.

Goldenrod coloured wool soaked and waiting for the dyeing to start.

I used Cushings Perfection dye in shades of Cherry Red and Egyptian Red, hence the moniker ‘Egyptian Cherry’.  Each colour was splotched over the wool to get a nice tonal, artsy feel to the finished product, then submerged in enough liquid to saturate all the fibres.

Since the base was tonal, I was counting on that to assist with the shading of the new colours.

It worked! Multi-hued Egyptian Cherry coloured wool.

It worked!  There are spots and splashes of dark purple, beautiful lengths of light to dark rust, some oranges, and lovely magenta streaks. Fabulous!

Swatch highlighting the subtle shades achieved with this successful over-dye!

The swatch highlights the many colours that now comprise this custom colourway.

Now to find, or create, just the right garment. Thinking this would be perfect for a useful cardigan with just a few cables or a bit of lace.

600 grams of Aran weight in my custom colourway ‘Egyptian Cherry’!

What would you suggest?

Have a beautiful week,

Coryna