Extraction of Natural Indigo Dye (From Indigofera Tinctoria)

The natural indigo we use in India comes from a plant called Indigofera Tinctoria. The plant itself is pretty amazing and has been used for generations as a crop to help fix soil depleted from farming. Depending on the weather, this crop can be harvested a couple of times in the year, at which point it immediately gets taken to a traditional extraction pool. The plant is left to ferment overnight, releasing the dye into a beautiful green pool. To get the dye into a state where it can be turned into a dried cake, the pool must be aerated, which was traditionally done by foot as you see in the video. More recently this has become mechanised (by use of a electric paddle repurposed from the fishing industry), although some traditionalists and craftspeople we work with insist they get better results by doing it manually.