Dyed Poplar

[Greg Just]

This is my first attempt at dying wood. I followed Steve Schlumpf's recommendations using Rit dye. Orginally these were to be liners for travel coffee mugs, but they turned out to be too small. I decided to experiment and this is what I got. Much too dark for the blue and I'm not crazy about the green. The wood was free so no real loss and it was a good learning experience. Poplar is easy to turn, but has no character. The blue one will make a nice pencil holder and I'm not sure what to do with the green one. The picture isn't very good, but the wood is really dark. Next time I might try red or orange.

[Steve Schlumpf]

Greg - guess the poplar, being a very soft wood, must have sucked the dye in like a straw! The birch that I dyed really had to be coated a few times before the color soaked in and evened out. Even then, the red dye that I used looked pink in places once it was dry. Only after a light sanding and getting some poly on the piece did the turning darken up to the color I had hoped for.

I think dyeing poplar would be a nice variation. Hope you experiment a little more and find a mixture that works!

[Bernie Weishapl]

Greg that is interesting. Boy it looks like it really soaked up the dye. I had a small one like that that I experimented with size and shape. Was going to toss it but the wife said finish it. She then put some of the green styrofoam in it they use for flower arrangements. She put small artificial flowers in it with a little artificial moss over the styrofoam and sits it on the kitchen table. Looks pretty cool. Just a thought.

[Jim Becker]

I like these even with the darker color...they are very rich looking. Nice work!