This article reports the implementation of a project involving Portuguese secondary-school chemistry teachers and their students. It explores formal and informal learning contexts integrating silk dye chemistry with historical and artistic heritages in an attempt to make chemistry more meaningful. The three different phases of the project are described. The first phase, the contextualization, involves a visit to a thematic museum and the searching and picking of natural dyeing species that are to be used in the second phase. The second phase is experimental. It involves the extraction of natural dyes, selected examples of synthesis, and mordant and dyeing activities. In the third phase several activities to promote a relationship between the secondary school and its local community and to develope and enlarge the chemistry learning contexts (STS interrelations) are carried out. Both the teachers and the students found the project interesting, pointing out that it went far beyond the academic dimension of chemistry.
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Selected examples of the experimental protocols are available.
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