Main constituents : laccaic acid. This extract is manufactured in India.

Uses :
Natural dye and textile printing : the colours obtained are similar to those resulting from cochineal. However, this extract provides better lightfastness and washfastness especially on silk and wool. Shades from purple to red are obtained according to the conditions of dyeing.

Products not intended for food or dietary supplements.

The insect, shellac, lack dye :
The lac insects are bred on various trees in India, in the southeast of Asia, Nepal and in the South of China since millenniums. They produce a resin, harvested on branch pieces named “sticklac”, that contains the red colouring agent also present in larvas and eggs. The resin, known under the name of “shellac” is widely used in cabinetmaking, music intruments making and protection of wooden works. It works as a real natural varnish. Purified shellacs are used in food (E904) and in pharmacy. The colouring agent is isolated from resin to become the ” lac-dye ” more easy to dye than the raw resin (that was formerly used but makes the fibers sticky).

Go back to Natural Extracts & Natural Dyes

Products not intended for food.

The plant :
Madder is one of the oldest dye plants used. Its scientific name means “dyer’s red”. It was well known and classified as “Grand teint” for its good lightfastness. The words “rouge garance” and “garance” entered the current French vocabulary.

Native from the Middle East, it was introduced in Europe since the Antiquity where it was intensively grown in several areas from the Middle Ages, as Flanders, Holland, the North, East and South of France where it brought prosperity at these times.

Go back to Natural Extracts & Natural Dyes

Main constituants : Carminic acid. This extract is manufactured in Peru.

Uses :
Natural dyeing & textile printing : This extract can be used to dye any fibre previously mordanted with alum and cream of tartar or gallnut. The resulting shades have good light- and washfastnesses. Deep reds, carmine to purple shades depending on the formula.

Fine arts, leisure and decoration : Cochineal can also be used for your fine paints, watercolours and natural inks.

Cochineal, the bug & products :
The cochineal insect Dactylopius coccus Costa is bred on cactusses – mostly the prickly pear – in nopalerias in Central America (Mexico), South America (Peru, Chile) and also in Canary islands. The nopal growing and cochineal breeding cultures were developed by by the pre-Columbian peoples of Mexico who used it to paint, for decorations and textile dyes.

Adult females are harvested just before they lay. This is the stage where the content in carminic acid – secreted by the insect as salt form to protect against predators – is maximum. The harvested bugs are then dried.

The bugs can be used directly or under the form of concentrated extracts for textile dyeing but also as pigments for fine paints and decoration. Cochineal is the only natural colour from animal origin that can be used as a food dye (E120 in Europe) but also in pharmaceuticals or the cosmetic specialities.

Products not intended for food or dietary supplements.

Go back to Natural Extracts & Natural Dyes

Main constituents : Alizarin as a free from or linked to a sugar (ruberythric acid). The free alizarin provides more red shades;  ruberythric acid provides more orange shades. This extract contains both forms of natural colouring agents.

Uses :
Textile dyeing & printing on natural fibers : Madder extract is the plant extract of European source the most used for natural pinks and red shades. It can be used on any fiber and combined with all mordants and many other dye extracts to obtain a very wide color range (orange, purple, “bronze”, browns, …)

Products not intended for food.

The plant :
Madder is one of the oldest dye plants used. Its scientific name means “dyer’s red”. It was well known and classified as “Grand teint” for its good lightfastness. The words “rouge garance” and “garance” entered the current french vocabulary.

Native from the Middle East, it was introduced in Europe since the Antiquity where it was intensively grown in several areas from the Middle Ages, as Flanders, Holland, the North, East and South of France where it brought  prosperity at these times.

Go back to Natural Extracts & Natural Dyes