Week 33 Amazing Mushrooms and Scrunchies

Wide legs, wax cloth and Scrunchies are where this design process found me this week. It might be hard to believe, but Scrunchies are in style again.  I think it is a reflection of my age since I gleefully remember the first time these fabric hair elastics were all the rage. But since science fascinates me as much as fashion, I must share this incredible story of connection. 

Given my husband's love of trees, there is often a lot of tree talk around our house. So you can imagine my excitement to discover this week that there exists a "wood wide web"

made up of a fungal network connecting trees and plants alike. 

Equally exciting is that this week I attempted a mushroom natural fabric dye. The mushrooms were gathered and the colour extracted by my friend Katherine.  With the precious golden liquid and my yard of fabric, I filled an ice cream container and set it aside for a few days to meld. 

The resulting colour and pattern, although not fully saturated, resembled the filaments and star like structures of brain cells. Incredibly coincidental since "the structure and function of the mycelial networks" are "noted for their similarity to brain cell networks."  

As David Suzuki says "Sometimes it takes a fascinating lifeform like a mushroom to shake us from our hubris and show us how much we have yet to learn about the world and our place in it."

I am that I am.