To ensure the dye didn’t wash out of the fabric, a mordant (a liquid that combines with the dye to render it holdfast) was needed. Only then would they release the rich purple colour. By some accounts as many as 250,000 snails to produce one single tablespoon of dye!Īll these snails had to be collected by hand, crushed, salted over three days and then boiled for ten more. Not just any old snail, mind you, but from several species of predatory sea snails known as Poirieria Zelandica, commonly called the spiny murex, found predominantly in the eastern Mediterranean.Įach snail produced only a few drops of the precious secretion, and so vast quantities were needed for commercial purposes. In fact, it would probably be more accurate to call it a 'back-end' story, seeing as how the famous purple dye was actually extracted from a gland just behind the rectum of a snail.Įach snail produced only a few drops of the precious secretion, and as many as 250,000 snails were required to produce one single tablespoon of dye! But Tyrian Purple – arguably the most noble colour of them all –has a truly ugly back story that’s more likely to fill you with revulsion. Many of the colours we’ve launched have quaint origin tales that imbue them with a certain charm.
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