Green Mordant Fixatives for Natural Dye Application on Fabrics

Abstract

Natural dyes are derived from plant parts such as roots, stems, leaves, bark, flowers, fruits and seeds. Either it can be produced as powder format or extract of the specific parts can be utilized. One of the major causes in the current scenario is synthetic dye effluent production, which can be alternatively changed by using plant extracts as natural dye and fixative agents called natural mordants. Three different plant sources selected for natural colourant extraction such as curcumin pigment from rhizome of Curcuma longa L., anthocyanin pigment from petals of Caesalphinia pulcherrima Sw. and Clitoria ternatea L. were extracted by adding the juice of Citrus limonum L. used as a citric acid natural solvent, citric acid crystals and water were used as solvent to extract dyes and seeds of Terminalia chebula used as natural mordant. The cotton fabric was dipped in fixative plant extracts, dried after some time and it is immersed in plant extracts of natural dye. Then, the fabric was examined under washing fastness and light fastness tests of the different natural dyes with Terminalia chebula seeds powder mordant application, which showed better results in the dye Curcuma longa L. The current study emphasises eco-friendliness and economic usefulness to the textile industries.