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We thought you might enjoy a short (crudely edited) video that shows a bit of the fabulous fabric we shipped out Friday .
NOTE: If you are planning to order custom fabric this week, do it today if you can. We're printing this week's orders tomorrow (Monday) for shipping on Thursday or Friday. If you put in an order after Monday morning it won't print until next week.
I've just gotta say here how excited I am about my new Spoonflower job. I had a half-formed mental picture of what it might look like, but I don't think I was prepared for how incredibly cool it is to see people's fabric designs printed up and in a big stack in my own house. It's like going to a new fabric store with designs you've never seen before! Really, that almost NO ONE has seen before. So cool. One thing I wasn't expecting was how much being printed on fabric really warms up a design. It might look digital on the Flickr site, but in real life, on cotton, all the designs looked warm and organic.
Stephen's working on a little video to be posted soon of some of these fabrics before we wrap 'em up and ship 'em out to their rightful owners. I can't wait for the next round!
I'm no Ryan Seacrest, but here's a short explanation of how to use Spoonflower to print your design on fabric once you're able to create an account.
[6-02-2008: Please note that due to bandwidth issues that were causing problems with the audio in this presentation, I've posted a new version to SlideShare.]
Another busy weekend, but this time it was because of sickish kids. There's been a whole lotta boogie-wiping going on here lately, and everyone three and under is cranky and sleepless. Isn't it amazing how sick kids can bring everything to a near standstill? As it should be, I suppose.
I did manage to get a simple sewing project done, though. Soulemama reminded me in a recent post that I, too, have these Japanese sewing books with tons of little girl clothing projects I've been meaning to get around to. I put them on hold awhile back because the weather was too cool to make them urgent. Today though? 90 degrees outside and this little tie shoulder top is perfect for my middle girl to stay cool in.
Updates for any of the testers who have tried to purchase fabric this week:
Thanks again for all the help!
We're shipping the first round of real orders this week and the batch we printed included Kim's first computer design using the (free) ArtRage download suggested by Meggiecat. It came out well, don't you think?
For ourselves, we also printed a big bunch of Spoonflower tags as well as a swatch of my fish fabric, which you may have spotted at some point in the Spoonflower Flickr pool:
Just want to make everyone aware that we've updated the instructions for preparing your image for fabric printing.
The important change is that you should expect that size your image for 150 dpi (dots per inch). If you increase the resolution by making it larger, we will end up printing the image at a larger size than you intended.
This is of course the MOST-asked question. Below is the pricing for fabric during the beta period, and it applies only to the Kona® cotton from Robert Kaufman. We may adjust these numbers at a later date and pricing will certainly vary between products as we endeavor to introduce additional fabric options.
Swatch (8" x 8") $5.00
Fat quarter (21" x 18") $11.00
1 yard (42" x 36") $18.00
2 yards (42" x 72") $36.00
3 yards (42" x 108") $54.00
4 yards (42" x 144") $72.00
5 yards (42" x 180") $90.00
Notes:
There's no single answer to this question, but I can offer a few suggestions.
Professional textile designers frequently use Photoshop to create or prepare their designs. They might start with a scan of a painting or drawing or they might compose the image in Photoshop. The pros also sometimes use special plugins for Photoshop. But Spoonflower is not just for pros, so...
There are a number of free programs available for creating and manipulating images, a few of which were sent to me recently by Meggiecat, a terrific craft blogger:
Note (6-23-2008): Do NOT try to upload TIF files created using Microsoft Image Composer. If that is the only program you have for preparing designs, save and upload a JPG instead of a TIF.
Other ideas:
e amazing galleries available online. Be aware that you may only be able to employ an image of this sort for private, rather than commercial, use. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Association, for example, offers incredible galleries online, including this one: Art of the NOAA Photo Library.Tell me what you come up with and I'll add it to the list!
What a weekend! If it wasn't apparent from his many posts about the site, Stephen spent pretty much the whole weekend sitting in front of a computer. For my part, I'm helping with idiot-proofing. I'm positive that I'm the most tech-UNsavvy person helping start an internet company there is.
That said, though, I'm a fast learner. I'm getting the hang of trying to "draw" on a computer and managed to produce a little floral design that Stephen says got printed today. 
It ain't fabulous, but it's mine! I'm looking forward to seeing a fat quarter of my design when Stephen gets home this evening. I forgot to set my resolution to 150 dsi and have no idea how pixels translate into inches--though I told Stephen a conversion chart might be a handy feature for us non-techy types--so it should be interesting...
The site is back up this morning but there are still a few bugs to troubleshoot, including one involving purchases using Paypal. Credit card purchases seem to be fine. This afternoon I'll:
a) do my best to post something more interesting than site development news,
b) begin to beautify the new blog a bit...
More invites out this afternoon and tomorrow.
As of 10pm Eastern Time, the Spoonflower home page appears to be down...
Never fear! We'll get there.
This may be a bit maddening for all the folks who haven't yet received an invite (which is almost everyone), but I just want to ask the very few who have created accounts on Spoonflower so far to be sure to let us know when you encounter problems. We discovered one error today that was creating difficulties for people trying to upload designs using Internet Explorer, but it has now been fixed. Send a description of any bugs you encounter to help at spoonflower.com. Thanks!
I am positively thrilled to announce that we now have a real web site that works and is live at www.Spoonflower.com. A couple of caveats, however:
-- You cannot register for the site, you can only add your name to the waiting list
-- The waiting list (as of this writing) is actually down over the weekend because of maintenance issues at MailChimp, the list host
-- You cannot login to the site until we send you a password and invitation by email, which we'll be doing in batches over the next few weeks
-- Lots of stuff is still missing, links are broken, but we'll be working on that over the next few days.
For now we will take any image you upload and either tile it to fill the area of your fabric order or crop it to fit within the area of your fabric order as necessary.
We will not "step" the design repeats and we will not alter the size or dimensions of the design you upload.
If you want to print a single large image you should set up the image at the actual size you plan to print. You could set up a single image to be a linear yard, for example (which in our case would actually be 36"x44"), then order a yard.
If you wanted a smaller image on a yard of fabrc but do NOT want us to tile it to fill the area, set up your image with white space around it to fit the area of fabric you plan to order.
For the time being we ship exclusively through the US Postal Service or, if you are an International customer, through the USPS and your national service.
Shipping rates as of May 2008 are as follows:
Swatch --$1 Special Domestic Shipping Discount during Beta--
Domestic shipping:$3.50-- $1.00 --
International : $7Fat Quarter
Domestic shipping: $3.50
International: $10Yards (any amt 1-5)
Domestic shipping: $7
International: $12
During the beta we will be fulfilling orders very slowly. You should expect it to take up to three weeks to receive your fabric if you live in the domestic US. International orders will take even longer.
This is not the way we want it to be. Eventually we aim to print and ship every order within a day. But before you run you have to learn to crawl. We appreciate your patience.
Updated on Tuesday 5-20-2008
FORMAT: When printing a design onto fabric using Spoonflower you'll get the best results when you upload a file in TIF format that has been created in (or converted to) LAB color space. You can also upload a JPG or a PNG.
Tip: In Photoshop you can switch to LAB format by going to the Image menu and pulling down to Mode, then checking LAB color. You'll also want to make sure that in the same menu 8 bits/channel is checked rather than 16.
FILE SIZE: Your image can be any size as long as the file is smaller than 25MB.
RESOLUTION: Set up your image at 150 dpi (dots per inch). If you want to design an 8"x8" swatch, for example, you need to upload an image that is 1200 pixels x 1200 pixels.
We will maintain each image uploaded at the size supported by 150 dpi, then tile it to fill the space of the fabric you order. If you upload an image larger than the area of fabric you order, then we will crop it from the lower left corner.
CONFUSED?
If you don't have Photoshop and talking about TIF and LAB color make you anxious, don't worry. You can upload a JPG or other common image format and it will still print nicely. There may be colors in your image that can't be reproduced by pigments on fabric in our printer (very bright colors, absolute blacks, and very saturated colors, for example). If that is the case you will sometimes see all of the colors in an image shift and the colors may end up appearing different from what you expected.
Uploading an image in LAB color offers some protection against all of the colors shifting. In LAB color, if the printer encounters a color it can't reproduce it will shift only that color rather than all the colors.
If you're curious (and technically inclined) you can read more about TIFs here, and more about LAB color here.
For the time being Spoonflower only offers one choice of fabric for printing.
Designs printed through Spoonflower will appear on 100% Kona® cotton from Robert Kaufman Fabrics. The cotton is 4.3 oz per square yard, 44" wide and ideal for quilting. For you fabric geeks out there, it is also mercerized.
It is our hope to offer additional fabric choices in the near future. If you'd like to weigh in on what kinds of fabric you would most like to see, please drop Kim a line.
These days it seems like the only free crating time I have left is late in the evenings, when we've (finally!) gotten all the girls settled quietly into bed. This time also happens to be the only kid-free time I have in the day to talk to my dear spouse, and I don't want to just disappear into the room that passes for my studio but which is in fact our fireplace-Christmas tree-family dance party-other living room. (After 2 years in this house, I still haven't settled on a name for this room, though I do so wish it could just be a family crafting studio...)
So given that I don't want to completely ignore Stephen, I like
small projects that I can do from the sofa while we chat and watch the
news and just unwind together. Brushing up on my rusty drawing skills
lately is an activity that works, as is cutting out fabric printing
stencils for the girls and I to play around with. I've also run
across a couple other small projects that look coffee table-sized,
cute, and fun. By way of Craftzine, verybigjen has an eyeball pincushion tutorial 
on Flickr.
(Do I need to explain how psyched my two bigger girls will be when I finish one?)
The Purl Bee is always good for lovely little projects, and I've been thinking about making up some sweet hankies ever since I saw their tutorial.
Meggiecat's going to think I'm stalking her, but I've gotta give her credit for finding mollychicken's adorable fabric house tutorial. Another project my girls are going to go crazy for, I'm sure. I should be set for the weekend, I think!
I have good news and bad news.
The good news is that sometime tomorrow (Friday) when you visit Spoonflower you will see the new home page of our beta site. Hurray! [We owe particular thanks for getting the machine up and running to a talented fellow named Clinton.] That's really good news.
The bad news, however, is a real downer. Even for those of you who have signed up for the beta (and thank you, thank you, thank you for doing that), until you receive an email from us containing a password for your account, you won't be able to register or login to the new site. That's frustrating, I know.
It's going to take us a bit of time to scale up our production capacity just to meet the demand from the beta group. While this bodes well for Spoonflower's future plans, it is going to mean asking many of our merry band of crafters to be patient for a while.
In the meantime I'm going to try to flesh out the FAQ section over the next few days to help answer some of the detailed questions that many of you have emailed. We'll have a new blog tomorrow as well, by the way. All of the old blog content will carry over with the sole disadvantage being that you'll no longer be able to tell which of the past posts were mine (Stephen) or my wife's (Kim). If it had anything to do with crafting, pretty safe to assume it was Kim.
Thanks, Rebecca, for the link to a great tutorial on how to make repeat patterns. Written by guest blogger Julia Rothman for design sponge, this could be the perfect one-stop lesson on how to tile a design so that you don't end up with bizarre, empty seam lines on your custom printed fabric.
Now, if only I could draw like Julia Rothman...
When I was in college I worked in a vintage clothing shop. I loved to work my shifts surrounded by gorgeous old dresses, hand-embroidered textiles, and collectible bric-a-brac. I would sometimes imagine who might have worn a particularly lovely frock, whose hands might have made all those tiny stitches bordering a linen tablecloth, and how all these things survived more or less intact and ended up there.
I have three daughters and have sewed many things for all three of them--baby blankets, bibs, stuffed toys, bed quilts, dresses. Now I'm on the other end of things. I enjoy imagining my girls treasuring these things mama made for them when they're grown up and I'm gone. I like to think that, while not expertly put together, they're at least sturdy enough to hold up for their lifetimes, sturdy enough that they might pull them out one day to show them to their own kids. (Well, except for the bibs which see some pretty heavy, yucky use.)
If this is part of why you sew, you'll want to read this pdf article on how various fusible and adhesive sewing products hold up over time. It's a technical article and I'm sorry about the formating, but it's well worth getting through if you use fusible web, fusible batting, quilt basting spray and the like in your sewing projects. If you're like me and you'd like your quilts and embroideries to hold up through a generation or two for your grandkids to ogle, then it looks like our options are limited. I guess sometimes the old ways of hand-basting and flannel reinforcement are best. And here's to hoping that our beautiful works don't end up in a random shop someday, presided over by a clueless college girl!
Our local quilt shop regularly offers great sewing classes, some of which have nothing to do with quilting. Probably my favorite class was one taught by Karen West on how to make toothbrush rugs. Considering how little there is on-line about these rugs, let me explain here. A toothbrush rug is made with long strips of fabric kinda looped together with a tool made from an old toothbrush with its bristly head sawed off, a hole bored into one end, and the other end filed to a point. It looks like this. The looping technique reminds me a lot of crochet, though I haven't crocheted anything since I was 5 and my mom taught me how to make a long chain. You can order rug patterns with instructions and toothbrush tools here. (Or perhaps a tutorial is in order here?)
I made the rug above from batiks and shot cottons. Robert Kaufman's luminous chambray solids would work great, too, I bet. Ideally, you'll use fabrics that are dyed on both sides because you do see both sides of the strips. (Did I mention that it's reversible? Woo-hoo!) That said, these rugs use a LOT of fabric--around 8 yards or so for an oval measuring 2-1/2 by 3-1/2--so using fabric you have on hand that you otherwise can't find a use for is a good idea, too. Stick with non-slippery fabrics of the same weight and yours should turn out great--heavy, hard-wearing, washable, and made up of the colors that you've handpicked for your room!
Anyone else out there have school-aged children? I've got a 4th grader and it all of a sudden hit me this morning that with the end of the school year fast approaching on June 6, I've got a couple of teacher gifts to figure out. Wouldn't it be nice to make some thank you presents for a change instead of going the box of gourmet chocolates route? Of course it would.
Earlier this school year, I made a set of cloth grocery bags for the school's silent auction fund-raiser, loosely based on one of the cloth totes in The Impatient Patchworker
But I may just make one of the fabulous projects featured on the Sew Mama Sew Tutorial Contest. So far, my other favorite teacher gift idea is the Square(ish) Bottomed Hobo Lunchbag from Emily at sewing notions. It's too late to enter the contest now, but I definitely recommend that you spend an hour (or more!) perusing the several rounds' worth of submissions. I guarantee you'll come away inspired with a fresh list of projects to try. I know I did! (Like I need more inspiring projects on my list....)
Woo-hoo! As I mentioned the last time I posted, I've been very inspired...hmmm, make that obsessed now, by Lotta Jandsdotter's Lotta Prints. Finally, finally, over the weekend I managed to get some potatoes carved so that my 3-year old daughter and I could do some printing together. Success! Permanent fabric paint is a little scary around a toddler, but on the other hand it's just clothes she'd be ruining, right? And I'm trying to be better about letting my kids have access to "the good stuff," as Soulemama talks about in The Creative Family. Yeah, another book I'm obsessed with.
The large navy blue starry shapes are actually made from quilter's template plastic I had lying around, but the rest are spud-based. I kinda like the two ovals stamped on top of one another best, I think. It should take me only a mere five more days to hem them all into tea towels!
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