Skye Livingston is an artist, sewist, dyer, and educator, and the person behind Hello Hue Studio.
She earned her BFA in Fiber Arts from the Kansas City Art Institute and has spent her time since traversing the creative field of textiles.
After starting Hello Hue Studio as a naturally-dyed textile production company in 2020, she has since shifted to creating custom upholstery and drapery commissions, as well as teaching natural dyeing classes.
Hello Hue Studio is created and run by Skye Livingston. Located in an amazing historic mill building on the New Hampshire seacoast, Hello Hue Studio is a one-woman operation dedicated to creating artful textile pieces through environmentally responsible production practices.
Natural dyes are simply amazing: colorful chemicals in organic materials bond with metallic salts and bind to natural fibers.
Hello Hue uses a variety of natural dyes, many of which are collected locally. When possible, we forage and collect our own dyestuffs, otherwise we order the most unprocessed natural dyes from the best sources we can find.
The dye process is fairly laborious: fabric is scoured (simmered in lightly soaped water to remove residual milling chemicals) and organic material from particular plants and insects is prepared for dyeing, typically through a process of soaking/simmering in water, and/or pounding or grinding the natural dye material.
In order to achieve the brightest and longest-lasting colors, we use a 3-step process for dyeing: 1. tannin soak, 2. mordant soak, 3. dye soak. And of course everything is thoroughly washed after the dyeing process is complete.
While Hello Hue Studio is not currently producing dye lots or product lines, natural dyeing is still a part of Skye’s creative practice and educational endeavors.