Ever wanted to be able to dye your own custom sashiko threads easily, without fuss and mess? Now you can!

Olympus have come up with this great dyeing system, which uses a 'dye pen' to literally colour in your sashiko threads. It could not be easier. This excellent starter kit gives you all you need (apart from some clingfilm, water and a cup!) to dye your own threads in a rainbow of colours.

I've dyed sashiko threads with Procion dye (can be messy), Dylon machine dyes (in the microwave - also a bit messy, and with the potential to stain everything too), and indigo (incredibly messy and complicated). This new dye system is very easy - load up the dye pen, lay out your thread on some clingfilm, and off you go.

Please watch this video I've loaded up onto YouTube to see EXACTLY how it is done! Thanks to Takeshi san and the great team at Olympus for creating a version with English subtitles for me! The video is your free dyeing tutorial, so please refer to it whenever you want.

Contents of dye kit - three 10ml dyes, one 10ml dye fix, three dye pens, three 20m 6-ply sashiko threads prepared for dyeing, plus instructions (Japanese for now, but we are working on English instructions - for now, please watch the tutorial). Notebook and pencil not included, but I think you will have those. The yellow, blue and red dyes have been chosen so you can mix an infinite number of colours from them - they are basically yellow, cyan, and magenta, the three basic dye colours from which you can create just about any secondary (greens, oranges and purples) or tertiary colour (browns, and colours like kahki, russet, or brick red). You can dye three rainbow threads as shown, or play around and create your own colourways.

The dye pens can be reused, and I will be selling dyes separately soon. Initially, there will also be a big box set of all 15 dyes plus extra dye fix; extra dye pens; and extra dye fix sachets. It is recommended that you don't mix up the colours that you use in each dye pen, because darker colours will stain the applicator, and could discolour subsequent lighter dyes. So don't use your yellow dye pen for blue, or blue for red etc. For the purest colour, keep one pen per dye. Once these arrive, I will experiment with them and let you know what happens!

Dyes are non toxic, but please be sensible and keep them away from pets. Older children would be able to use these dyes with supervision. Please use your common sense!