"From indigo leaves to purple sea snails to ebony silt to bright orange mushrooms, Keith Recker offers an insightful and personal exploration of dyestuffs and pigments found in our natural surroundings. In this beautifully photographed volume, Recker invites readers into a vibrant and inspiring world of color, and the lives of diverse practitioners around the globe who are dedicated to making this world a reality. Scholars, designers, artists, and enthusiasts who share Recker's passion for traditional craftsmanship, sustainable fashion, and the handmade should make this book a touchstone in their libraries." -- Cristin McKnight Sethi, Ph.D., Assistant Professor of Art History, The Corcoran School of the Arts and Design, George Washington University, and Editorial Board Member of The Textile Museum Journal
"It's always stunning to look through the lens of Keith Recker's creative eye: the pages of True Colors vibrate with beauty, wellness, wisdom, and love." -- Paulette Cole, CEO, ABC Carpet and Home
"Keith Recker introduces us to artisans all over the world--from hereditary craftspeople in indigenous communities to millennial fashion designers--dedicated to harvesting the color by fermenting plants or boiling flowers or pulverizing beetles or milking snails. It is shocking how little most of us know about how the natural world has yielded its colors to us for millennia, even though it's only been a tiny blip of time in human history that we have been relying on synthetic dyes. What's even more shocking is that nearly every one of the methods Recker highlights--from indigo to cochineal--had all but died out in the very communities where people had once practiced them for generations. The makers in this book have diligently reclaimed older techniques and practices, bringing back essential aspects of their own cultural identities. The current revival in creating color from nature is an act of imagination, and an expression of our shared humanity." -- Deborah Needleman, writer and former editor of T: The New York Times Style Magazine, WSJ Magazine, and founding editor in chief of Domino Magazine
"Linking textile dyeing to massive problems with pollution in the wet processing of contemporary textiles, True Colors elevates the value and beauty of traditional dye practices. The book venerates traditional cultures with long histories of natural dyeing, as well as contemporary practitioners and applications, acting as an antidote to mainstream fashion's wasteful and polluting processes. By highlighting dye masters from around the world, Keith shows that natural color can be a means to affect positive change--a welcome challenge to the system." -- Sass Brown, Assistant Lecturer and PhD Candidate, Manchester Metropolitan University
"Vivid in every sense, True Colors locates natural dyes as an unexpectedly rich intersection be- tween past and present. Capturing the voices of both traditional practitioners and innovative designers from across the globe, the book covers the full spectrum of a fascinating subject." -- Glenn Adamsong, Senior Scholar, Yale Center for British Art
"No one will protect what they don't care about, and none will care about what they have never experienced, ' says Sir David Attenborough. True Colors is an ode to natural dyeing, its endless palette and the inspiring people who continue the practice. The book will make the uninitiated in natural dyes fall in love with their magic. The book's important argument for natural dyeing and organic agriculture will, hopefully, jolt us out of the chemical dye addiction that poisons our homes and selves." -- Kavita Parmar, designer and founder of The IOU Project
