The sweet smell of ... hollyhocks?

Hollyhocks may have a lot of things going for them,

but scent is not one of them.

A driven plant breeder will probably develop a fragrant one some day

[breeders seem to strive for weird unusual attributes like that].

Till then, hollyhocks are hard to beat when it comes to garden stature.

And the so-called  *black*  ones?
They're unbeatable for  another  reason ...

This might be my favorite cloth from any of our dye sessions last season ... fresh rose leaves
as resists, surrounded by wild blackberries (here, the raspberry color)
cooked in a pot of carrot tops.
And that deep inky purple?  Well, that came from these fellas ....

~ photo courtesy of wood11 ~

If these aren't a variety called 'The Watchman,' then they are kin at least.

One of the flower floozies in our dye group had a patch in her garden and shared

the bounty.  Oooh, she is nice, isn't she?

And I almost kissed her when she handed all of us some seeds at season's end!

It was one of those wraps that as it came off the can

I literally caught my breath ... the colors were so unexpected, so intense.

I thought they'd end up a couple of shades lighter after the cloth dried,

but there has been virtually no change.

Now that spring has finally hit I've been like a madwoman working in the garden, one of my
greatest joys (and definitely my biggest backache, oy vey).  All so good, not complaining a bit really ...
with India Flint coming to teach us in September, I have decided to forego the quantity of veg
 I usually grow and fill those spaces with an assortment of floozie-ness
~ petals & leafage ~
for natural dyeing
instead.

There is an entire raised bed dedicated to just these hollyhocks.
I couldn't help myself.

:::


For a look at some inky BLUE color, go see what jude has been doing with black beans ...