ao textiles

natural dyes at London Fashion Week 2018

We have been involved with many projects with couture designer Deborah Milner over the years. For London Fashion Week September 2018 her sustainable couture collection 'Regenerating the Reef' launched at SHOWstudio.  We were thrilled to collaborate on the fabrics, working with our natural dye expertise and in partnership with Gainsborough Silk Weavers. 

Dye colours for Deborah’s jacquard weave fabric are repeatable, commercially reproducible and used a variety of plant dyes, including madder and logwood.  This was a real achievement as manufacturing capabilities with natural dyes disappeared in the West shortly after the invention of synthetic dye,Perkins Purple in 1856.

Dye equipment for contemporary textile manufacturing is geared towards synthetic processing.  At ao textiles we value the environmental benefits and extraordinary colour quality of natural dyes and celebrate the fact that designers such as Deborah Milner recognise this too.