Friday, September 16, 2011

Design Your Own

As much as I love shopping for fabric, I've always wanted to design my own. In the past I've produced some original swatches by printing via laserjet onto photofabric, and by hand dyeing or painting white cotton and muslin, but I've never had a chance to design and produce actual yardage.

I have some promo projects in mind for next year that would be better if I could design the fabric involved, so I checked my quilting-related bookmarks, and found a site called Spoonflower that I had never really investigated. I think when I first visited it my old computer wouldn't let me access or use the design generator pages.

Fortunately this time around I got into them, and in about five minutes had a finished design based on this photograph I took of two of my roses back in 2009:



I liked how the design came out so much that I ordered a yard of it, which I think will also give me a decent firsthand look at the quality of fabric Spoonflower produces from uploaded designs (and once it arrives I'll report more on that.) If this works out well I will definitely be doing more of this for future personal and promo projects.

While cruising around the Spoonflower site I also noted they have regular themed contests for fabric designs (winners are awarded a nice-sized credit toward Spoonflower purchases) and they also sell your designed fabric in their marketplace (designers get 10% of the sale price, paid to them in site purchase credits or as straight payments via Paypal.) Since there is no cost involved in putting your design up for sale -- the site does everything for you but design it -- this could be a neat way for you creative souls out there to earn some extra income.

9 comments:

  1. Oh my goodness, that is the most incredibly cool site! I absolutely *have* to learn how to sew now. I can just imagine my daughter's reaction to being allowed to create the fabric for her own skirt!

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  2. Cool! Thanks for the idea! :)

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  3. This could be a lot of fun. Thanks for the link.

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  4. Fascinating! I can't wait to see your results.

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  5. Depending on what the final cloth looks like, I may want a few yards of that print myself. I love roses.

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  6. That site is SO cool. Textile geeks and crafty types huzzah!

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  7. Anonymous10:44 AM

    I had no idea a person could do this! What a great site! I love your flower print btw.

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  8. I love unique and unusual fabrics. I have tons of them. This would be awesome though to finally have something of my own.

    How long did they say the order would take? I can't wait to hear the results.

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  9. Oh my gosh, I'm so glad you posted this. My sister is a whiz when it comes to photography and editing photos and this could be a great site for her to earn a little side cash while she's going back to college and working. Thank you!

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