IPIAK - exotic dye from Ecuador
Social commitment
IPIAK - exotic dye from Ecuador
To ensure that customers can buy AURO products with a clear conscience, we attach great importance to the fair sourcing of raw materials, also with regard to biodiversity.
The red colorant achiote is called “Ipiak” by the Shuar Indians living in Ecuador and is obtained by grinding the oil seeds of the annatto bush in the Amazon lowlands. Ipiak was discovered by AURO in 2011 as a new raw material and since then it has been used as a supplementary pigment in the wall glaze plant color.
We support the organization “education biotropical”, which is re-cultivating an area of rainforest west of the Andes that has been 96% destroyed. With this project, AURO is also supporting the Shuar Indians, who traditionally produce and use this dye. AURO undertook its first support in 2012 by purchasing primary virgin forest to protect it from destruction and overexploitation.
To ensure the legal security and sustainable impact of its work, the organization buys the land with donations. A research station, where biologists register and research plants, and gentle ecotourism are being set up. To protect the area from hunting settlers, the Shuar Indians and volunteers from all over the world are guarding the area to enable undisturbed recultivation. Among many other plants, the annatto bush, which provides the red dye for the AURO wall glaze plant color, is being cultivated here again.
Annatto
The Amazon lowlands in Ecuador are home to the annatto shrub, whose coloring seeds are used in both cosmetics and cooking.
Traditional use in the kitchen
Ipiak also has a long tradition in the kitchen: in southern Mexico and Nicaragua, the seed is used as a spice. In the form of a paste, it serves as the basis for the cochinita pibil popular in the Yucatán or as a paste for marinating meat. Ipiak has a relatively weak but characteristically earthy taste and also gives dishes a beautiful color.
Cosmetic use
In addition to its use in local cuisine, the indigenous community of the Tsachilas, an indigenous people in Ecuador, use Ipiak to rub on their bodies; the aroma of the oil seeds keeps insects away. The seeds are ground and the resulting paste is rubbed all over the body and into the hair. The red dye is also used for cosmetic purposes as red body paint, which is applied to protect against sunburn and for spiritual purposes.
Glazes for attractive wall design
The strong red Achiote dye found its way into the AURO raw material range through external advice from the AURO contact network and is used as a supplement to the color spectrum in the wall glaze plant colors in the color shades Ipiak Red (yellow tone) No. 21, Reseda Madder Orange No. 29 and Cochineal Red No. 49.
The wall glaze plant colors have always been produced by AURO from pure plant pigments. Depending on the desired color intensity, these can be diluted with water and painted with a glaze brush or dabbed onto white walls with a sponge. If several layers of paint are glazed on top of each other and each layer has dried individually, it is possible to create “living” walls that clearly stand out from one-dimensional walls painted in a single color.
