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Center: Gart, Spoonflower co-founder
Left: Turner, Gart's singing son and a departing Spoonflower team member
Right: Ezra, nephew of Gart and departing intern who has been working with the Spoonflower engineering team on a set of experimental new features for the web site
Missing: Theron, cousin of Ezra and Turner and our second departing intern
![[button] Vote now for your favorite zig-zag cheater quilt patterns](https://d2q0qd5iz04n9u.cloudfront.net/_ssl/proxy.php/http/gallery.mailchimp.com/dee209d512d07ce1c58bd6a4f/images/VoteNow.png){kind=small}
The participants this week are:
1. 2_cheater quilt in the style of a
zig-zag by isabella_asratyan
2. 70's Glass Zig Zag Cheater by
glanoramay
3. A Desert Mirage - quilt by
rhondadesigns
4. A happy gnome zig zag / cheater
quilt by paragonstudios
5. A Prince's Quilt by susanpolston
6. abstract seamless lines by
anastasiia-ku
7. African_Safari by art_on_fabric
8. Alexandrite Zig-Zag cheater quilt
by katarra
9. aloha love by shellyaloha
10. Amazing by whimzwhirled
![[button] See the top 10 school supply fabrics](https://d2q0qd5iz04n9u.cloudfront.net/_ssl/proxy.php/http/gallery.mailchimp.com/dee209d512d07ce1c58bd6a4f/images/SeeTheTop10.png){kind=small}
The final voting results:
1. 639 votes for Doodled School Supplies by pennycandy
2. 530 votes for Coloured Pencil Love by kayajoy
3. 499 votes for back_to_school by woodmouse&bobbit
4. 481 votes for Dancing School supplies by padeshahoo
5. 468 votes for pencil by policunha
6. 417 votes for Inspirational Pencils by jumping_birds
7. 379 votes for doodle_supplies by johanna_design
8. 338 votes for Pencils by mawaridi
9. 324 votes for a la rentree by minimiel
10. 313 votes for Draw, Cut, Glue by jennartdesigns
The kids are back in school this week and while I haven't been counting down the hours 'til the kids go back to school, I have to admit that I have a lot more time to think all of a sudden. And when I have time to think, I often think about projects I'd like to make for myself that maybe I put on hold a couple of months ago when the kids were just getting out of school. The weeks just following kids returning to school is always quite a busy time in the print room at Spoonflower, so I think this must be a pretty common scenario for a lot of you, too!
I've run across a beautiful line of women's clothing patterns recently that have jumped to the top of my sewing to-do list. Sewaholic patterns are created by Vancouver based Tasia and billed as "sewing patterns for the modern seamstress," and I want to make almost every single one of them for myself now. (It's not too late to make a bare shoulder sundress, right?) You can ogle many pretty versions of all of Tasia's Sewaholic patterns in her Flickr pool. Like this version of the Cambie dress. Or this very pretty Alma blouse. Love.
If you want to try your hand at a brand-new Sewaholic pattern, just enter this week's drawing! We're giving away one Sewaholic pattern of your choosing plus 4 yards of any Spoonflower fabric to make it up in. To enter, just leave your comment here or on the corresponding Facebook post, and let us know which of the Sewaholic patterns you'd like if you're our winner. Please don't forget to include your Spoonflower screen name or some other means of tracking you down easily in case you win. Entries close next Tuesday, 9/4 at 7pm EST and we'll announce a winner on 9/5. Good luck, modern seamstresses! This giveaway is now closed and we'll be announcing a winner shortly.
Last week, we gave away a copy of Lunch Bags! plus two types of interfacing, Insul-Fleece, and regular fusible fleece to aid in your lunch bag-making projects. The winner was Lori Claflin in Massachusetts. Congrats, Lori!
This week guest blogger Diane Gilleland from CraftyPod returns to share a tutorial for turning five favorite Spoonflower designs into a beautiful bag.
Confession Time: Spoonflower's Fabric of the Week contests are one of my favorite workday distractions. It's lovely to spend a few minutes immersed in beautiful designs, and my favorite part is this:
When I see all the fabrics I've voted for in one place, I always think, "Wow, those would look so great together in a project!" So I decided to design that project – a tote bag that showcases five fabrics, and only requires one test swatch of each one. (In fact, with careful cutting I was able to get two totes out of my five swatches!) You can whip one of these up in just a couple hours.
These fabrics are from the recent Pomegranate Fabric Contest. I used Pomegranate Party by Cherished Dreams, A Jewel of a Fruit, by Floral Fascination, Pomegranates by Zeinab, Pom Pom by Spellstone, and Pomegranates by Fattcheese.
Materials (per tote):
Making the Patchwork Tote Front:
Download and print the PDF patchwork pattern, and decide which of your Spoonflower swatches you'll be using as Fabric A, B, C, D, and E. Then, use a ruler and rotary cutter to cut one piece from each fabric, using the dimensions labeled on the pattern.
Cut a long strip from your background fabric, measuring 1" tall by the width of the fabric (selvage to selvage). Now, cut this strip into four lengths as labeled in the pattern: 4", 4 ½" 5" and 10 ½". When you sew the patchwork, always place the right sides of the fabric pieces together.
All seam allowances in this project are ¼", unless otherwise specified. Feel free to pin the fabric pieces together before you sew them, or not – however you're most comfortable sewing!
Step 1: Sew the 4" background fabric strip to the bottom edge of Fabric A. Press the seam allowance toward Fabric A. Then, sew the top edge of Fabric B to the other side of that background strip. Press that seam allowance toward Fabric B. (This is the finished unit you see on the right side of the photo above.)
Now, sew the 5" background strip to the right edge of Fabric C. Press the seam allowance toward Fabric C.
Step 2: Sew the two units together as shown here. Then, take a moment and trim any edges that are a little on the wonky side so they're straight. Just line the fabric edges up with the guide lines on the cutting mat, and use your ruler and rotary cutter to make straight cuts.
And with that, the top half of our patchwork is done!
Step 3: Sew the 4 ½" background strip to the right edge of Fabric D. Press the seam allowance toward Fabric D. Then, sew the left edge of Fabric E to the other side of the background strip. Press that seam allowance toward Fabric E. This is the bottom half of our patchwork. If you need to, go ahead and trim its edges so they're straight.
We'll connect these two finished units with the 10 ½" strip we cut earlier.
Step 4: Now, take the patchwork unit we just completed in Step 3. Sew the top edge of this unit to the 10 ½" background strip. Press the seam allowance toward the print fabrics. Then, sew the bottom edge of the patchwork unit from Step 2 to the other side of that background strip. Press the seam allowance toward the print fabrics again.
Step 5: Now,we'll just tidy up our finished patchwork. Use your ruler, rotary cutter and the guide lines on your cutting mat to trim all four edges so they're straight and at 90 degree angles.
Looks good! Let's add some background to the edges.
Step 6: Now, cut another long strip from your background fabric, measuring 3 ½" tall by the width of the fabric (selvage to selvage). Cut one 10" length from this strip. This goes at the bottom edge of your patchwork block.
Next, cut two 13" lengths from the long strip. Take these, and trim them so they're 3" tall by 13" long. These are the sides of your patchwork.
Finally, cut one 2" by 10" strip. (Depending on the width of your fabric, you may be able to get this out of the remaining long strip, or you may need to cut it from the rest of your background fabric.) This 2" tall strip goes at the top edge of your tote.
Step 7: Let's sew these strips to our patchwork block to finish the front of the tote. Sew the 2" by 10" strip to the top edge of the patchwork. Sew the 3 ½" by 10" strip to the bottom edge of the patchwork. Press the seam allowances toward the patchwork.
Step 8: Now, sew the 3" by 13" strips to the right and left edges of the patchwork. Press those seam allowances toward the patchwork as well. Your finished piece may have some wonky edges again now. Don't worry about it – just trim them!
At this stage, I like to use the edge of my patchwork as a reference line for trimming. Here, I've lined up my ruler with the patchwork, and then lined the bottom of the ruler up with a guide line on my cutting mat. With that alignment, I can then move my ruler to the edge of the background fabric and trim it so it's parallel with the edge of the patchwork. (See how I've lined the raw edge of the background fabric up with another guide line on my mat? That's handy for making that trim accurately.)
Step 9: Now that your patchwork block is all straight and square, measure it, and write down those dimensions. (You'll need them again later to make a lining.)
Your patchwork will measure somewhere in the neighborhood of 14" by 13". If it's a little larger or smaller, don't worry about it! As long as the background strips on the right and left edges are the same width, all is well. Just use whatever the measurement is to cut an identical piece from your background fabric. This will be the back of your tote.
Making Straps:
Cut two more long strips from your remaining background fabric, each measuring 4" tall by 26" long. (That's just the length I like. If you prefer your tote straps longer or shorter, by all means, cut them to the length you like!). Fold each strip in half lengthwise with the right side facing out, pressing the fold with a hot iron. Open this fold back up and then carefully fold the two raw edges in so they meet at this fold line, as shown above. Press these two new folds as well. Then, refold each strap in half again so the raw edges are to the inside, and press the strap flat.
To finish your straps, stitch about ⅛" away from each long edge.
Assembling the Tote:
This video walks you through the assembly process from this point. We'll add the straps to our tote, make a lining with some pockets in it, and put the whole thing together. I made two pockets for my tote: the larger one used a 12" tall by 8" piece wide of fabric, and the smaller one used a 12" tall by 5 ½" wide piece. You can actually make your pockets any size you like – or even leave them out!
Varying the Size:
This tote is a little on the diminutive side – just large enough to carry your wallet, phone, sketchbook, a paperback, and a small water bottle on your day's adventures. If you'd like it to be bigger, you can always cut the background strips in Step 6 a couple inches wider and longer. Can you imagine having a little collection of these bags, each one with a different fabric theme?
Diane Gilleland blogs, podcasts, publishes, teaches, and makes videos about all things crafty over at CraftyPod.com. When she's not doing those things, she's doing whatever her cat tells her to do. And what's wrong with that?
And who are the intrepid designers in this week's contest?
1. #2 pencils by katherinecodega
2. A Back To School Fabric by
de-ann_black
3. a back to school mix by
orangeblossomstudio
4. A Geometry Lesson by demigoutte
5. a la rentree by minimiel
6. A New Set of Hand-Colored Pencils
by amy_lou_who
7. A Supply Stripe by
littlerhodydesign
8. Accidents happen! ~ Brown by
retrorudolphs
9. An apple for the teacher by
moirarae
10. Angry Monster Erasers by millyish
Continue reading "Time To Vote For Back-to-School Fabrics" »
One of the many joys of the vacation season is the chance to pick up and head into the great outdoors to pitch your tent beneath the stars. So, as summer in our part of the world comes to a close, we asked designers to have a go at creating fabrics that celebrate camping. The camping fabric winner turns out to be Canadian designer Lori Rudolph. Way to go, Lori!
1. 609 votes for Camping Crests by retrorudolphs
2. 526 votes for Roughing it by theboerwar
3. 520 votes for Lets_go_Camping by stacyiesthsu
4. 442 votes for Camp Firefly by wendy_lin
5. 430 votes for Camp Turtle by edmillerdesign
6. 429 votes for We love to go camping by cjldesigns
7. 424 votes for Camping by bora
8. 409 votes for Glamping by karistyle
9. 404 votes for Glamping by ebygomm
10. 390 votes for Happy Camper by jennartdesigns
With my kids about to return to school, this week has been a little nutty. We're attempting to cross a few remaining fun items off our summer to-do list but also going to dentist appointments, shopping for school supplies, pulling bigger clothes down from the attic for growing girls, and just generally gearing up for the return of the school routine.
Part of that school routine for us is packing lunches so when I ran across a book recently about making your own lunch boxes and sandwich wraps, I picked it up. Lunch Bags! 25 Handmade Sacks and Wraps to Sew Today, put out by Stash Books, features plenty of useful sewing projects for the bring-your-lunch-from-home crowd, whatever your age. Lunch bags of various types and sizes are well-represented but there are also sandwich wraps, snack bags, and even a toy felt food project thrown in. I've never made a lunch bag or wrap because the supplies are somewhat unfamiliar and maybe a little intimidating so my favorite tip, which inspired a genuine "Aha!" moment, is pulled from contributor Lucy Blaire's sandwich bag project. She uses quart-size plastic zipper bags as the inner liner of an oilcloth sandwich bag. (Why hadn't I thought of that?)
If you've got a lot of lunch-packing in your immediate future and want a venue to show off your sewing skills to the playground crowd, enter this week's giveaway for the Lunch Bags! book. We're also throwing in some lunch bag-making supplies--some fusible fleece, heavy- and medium-weight fusible interfacing, and some Insul-Fleece (an insulated interfacing)--so you don't have to spend time tracking down supplies and can get right down to sewing. Just comment here or on the corresponding Facebook post to be entered into this drawing. Entries close next Tuesday, 8/28 at 6pm EST, and we'll announce a winner on 8/29. As always, do include your Spoonflower screen name or some other means of tracking you down in case you're our winner. Good luck, hungry people!
Last week, we were giving away five big fat quarter bundles of designer Virginia Odien's new Hello Sunshine fabric collection, courtesy of the generous folks at Connecting Threads, plus five more hand-selected fat quarters of some of Virginia's Spoonflower designs. This meant we got to choose five winners, and they were Jean Janeri, Ravenz Tarot, Zjarie Paige Butterworth, Andybeedesigns, and Aerialkabuki. Congratulations, all, and we'll be in touch soon!
This week Diane Gilleland from CraftyPod shares a tutorial for making a modern placemat set using large scale Spoonflower prints and simple quilting techniques.
I love English paper piecing and fabrics with great big prints, but these two things don't always play so nicely together. So I decided to experiment with super-sizing some traditional paper pieced hexagons. I love the way they showcase these three beautiful designs from Spoonflower designer Holli Zollinger: Coral Lined Mosaic, Fish Scales Slate Full, and Diamond Circles Aqua, and the chevron lines of quilting make a nice frame.
Materials (per placemat):
Choosing fabrics for your hexagons:
For this project, you'll need prints that are large, but not too large for the hexagons. So, download the hexagon template. The hexies I'm using in this project are 4" across, and this measurement is useful as you're browsing for fabrics. Compare that 4" measurement to the same measurement on the handy scale ruler that's pictured with each fabric. How much of the pattern repeat will appear in a 4" x 4" area?
Making giant hexies:
Now, we'll create the big hexies and sew them together. This video shows you how:
Making the placemats:
When you have your set of three hexies all sewn together, it's time to assemble your placemat. I highly recommend that you install a walking foot on your sewing machine for this project. We'll be sewing through several layers of fabric here, and a regular presser foot has a tendency to shift those layers around too much while you stitch.
Check with your local sewing machine dealer, or try an online search for "(make and model of your machine) walking foot." If you don't have a walking foot, I've added some suggestions below for alternate ways you can this project.
Cut three 12" x 16" pieces of fabric: two from your background fabric and one from flannel. You may notice that my flannel doesn't match my project at all, and this is okay! It's just used as a batting layer here, and will be invisible in the finished placemat. This is a great opportunity to use up any scrap flannel you have in your stash.
Layer these three rectangles as you see here, with the flannel between the two pieces of background fabric. (The wrong sides of the background fabric pieces should be facing the flannel layer.) Match all four edges.
Now, take the hexie unit you made earlier and place it on top of this fabric stack. Center it side to side, and position the top points of the hexies 2" below the top edge of the background fabric.
Place lots of pins all over to keep all these layers in place. Pin a couple times inside each hexie and all over the background section.
Now, head to your sewing machine. Depending on the colors you’re using, you may want to thread your bobbin with a color that matches your background fabric, and thread your machine with a color that matches your hexies. Stitch the hexies down, sewing close to all the outside edges.
If you don't have a walking foot: You can hand sew along these edges, using a tiny hand stitch.
Next, sew right along each of the seam lines where you sewed the hexies together. If you don't have a walking foot: You can hand sew along these lines, or even skip this step.
With the hexies in place, we'll do some quilting to solidify all these fabric layers. I'm using "echo quilting" here, which simply follows the shape of the hexies. Start by stitching ¼" away from the edge of the hexies. Then, stitch another line ¼" away from that line, and repeat until you've covered the entire background with chevron stitching. I think this design accommodates precise lines or wonky lines equally well, so if your quilting lines get a little crooked, go with it!
If you don't have a walking foot: You may want to play with hand quilting – a placemat is a nice, small project for that technique. Try drawing the lines you want to quilt with an erasable fabric marker, and then sewing through all the layers along these lines with a small running stitch.
Once the quilting is done, it's time to bind our placemat. We're using a time-honored technique here called a "double fold binding." For this placemat, you'll need to make about 60" of binding. Take your leftover background fabric and cut two strips measuring 3" high by the width of the fabric. From here, you can follow Heather Bailey's excellent PDF tutorial to finish and install your binding. The's just one small alteration to this process when you're binding a placemat. Heather's tutorial says to begin sewing the binding on "in the middle of one side." With a placemat, begin sewing the binding along the bottom edge of the placemat, about 2" from one corner.
Give your freshly-bound placemat a good pressing, and you're all set! Variations: You can do all kinds of fun things with this design. You might use a background fabric with a tiny, subtle print alongside those large print hexies. You might quilt it in a more free-form pattern. You might bind it in a contrasting color. You might even arrange your hexies in a different configuration. Have fun giving this project your own unique stamp!
Diane Gilleland blogs, podcasts, publishes, teaches, and makes videos about all things crafty over at CraftyPod.com. When she's not doing those things, she's doing whatever her cat tells her to do. And what's wrong with that?
Today we're debuting a new series on the blog that we hope will inject a little fun into the Spoonflower blogging week. The Friday Photo will be a new pic posted--yep--each Friday and will feature the faces behind the printing, general antics, and maybe a few photos of Spoonflower fabrics spotted "in the wild" thrown in for good measure. We hope you'll enjoy these peeks into the workings of Spoonflower, and please feel free to let us know if you have any suggestions for subjects you'd like to see photographed. Happy weekend, y'all!
Stephanie, Chad, and Holly in safety gear at the new Spoonflower HQ, currently under construction. Hopes are high for our expanded office and printing space which will include a front meeting area for tour groups--decorated, of course, with many gorgeous Spoonflower fabrics! Read more about the move here: Spoonflower growing its space in Durham (Triangle Business Journal)
If you followed the contest this past week, you know that we challenged designers to come up with cut & sew patterns for quarter-yard pieces of fabric. The goal was to create a set of fun projects for the folks planning to attend a local event as part of Etsy's 2012 Craft Party. The winner this week is a first-timer who created a charming set of stuffed fabric finches: Shel of PotBellyBears. Way to go, Shel!
The final voting results:
1. 524 votes for Fun Finches by potbellybears
2. 490 votes for Amelia and her kittens by stacyiesthsu
3. 438 votes for Fat Quarter Globe by evenspor
4. 424 votes for "Wish You Were Here" hand-made Michigan mitt/potholder by saltlabs
5. 409 votes for envelope purse by melimiliá
6. 376 votes for iPad/journal bag for mushroom lovers by bippidiiboppidii
7. 331 votes for Skelley Baby Doll by shelleyfaye
8. 304 votes for Pillows of Lavender by bzbdesigner
9. 268 votes for The birdie bag by addilou
10. 251 votes for Roxie_Puppet by roxiespeople
Continue reading "10 Easy Cut & Sew Projects From Our Craft Party Contest " »
This week, we're really pleased to be bringing you a virtual chat with Spoonflower designer, Virginia Odien, also known as Vo_aka_VirginiaO. Viginia's been with Spoonflower since almost the very beginning, has nearly 200 designs available in her Spoonflower shop on which to feast your eyes, and has won three fabric-of-the-week contests here. So it was no surprise to us to learn that Virginia also recently won a fabric design contest on Connecting Threads! Beating out thousands of other contest entries, Virginia's "Laundry Day" design was the starting point for her brand-new fabric collection Hello Sunshine, now available for sale through Connecting Threads. Read on for more about Virginia and a chance to win a pile o' fabrics at the end!
You’ve been on Spoonflower for over three years now, almost from our very beginning. Were you designing fabrics even before that?
Oh no, I’d never even thought about designing fabric before! I was simply someone who played around making graphics in graphics programs for fun. I started designing once I found Spoonflower and thought, “I can do that...I think.” I entered the 2010 calendar contest (where I didn’t have to do a repeat, hallelujah! ) and came in second place after Danielle Hanson. Yahooooo! That second place win created a whole new paradigm for me and I had to figure out how to make a repeating design! Back in the day, I had to take home-ec and typing classes. Doing art wasn’t really an option and oddly, it just never entered my mind that I could be taught to hone my doodling skills!
What do you do for a living when you're not designing fabrics?
My background is in project management and customer service. Currently I work in the media relations and marketing department of a university, doing whatever needs to be done. The more creative and complex the solutions I can come up with, the more I enjoy my day job. But really my heart and soul is in my night work at home, project-managing my creative processes and finding new solutions to creating new designs. It's really like playtime for me and I love managing myself since I never talk back (much)!
What inspired your new Hello Sunshine fabric collection?
A Spoonflower contest! I entered and won the leprechaun contest by wanting to create something different than pots of gold and little green men so I went with a humorous look at a leprechaun’s laundry.
I’m sure lady leprechauns think male leprechauns are handsome but I could only draw ugly leprechauns so I went with their laundry instead. I included their smallclothes and voters loved seeing their underwear and where they kept their family jewels. (Oooh, can I say that here?) I thought the Connecting Threads quilting audience might like a more general theme of laundry and I wanted something that evoked a light-filled, breezy summer day. The August heat also inspired me. I thought it would be a great way to remember summer when winter arrived and you might want to curl up under a fabulous, summery quilt.
Some of the prints in Virginia's "Hello Sunshine" collection, including her winning "Laundry Day" design.
What other things inspire you in your design work?
Oh, I have a big list for this question! My family for sure. I have a big group of fellow Spoonflwer designers who I talk to almost daily and we all give each other encouragement, hurrahs, and congratulations. They all bring a sense of humor to the table. Then there are my customers; I’m inspired by their comments and feedback, their emails, and their willingness to buy my designs to make things for themselves or others. I love when customers send me photos of their finished projects--fat quarter projects, yard projects, they’re all thrilling to see.
I recently sold 69 yards of one of my designs, “Gear Up.” I was curious to know what someone would do with THAT much fabric and it was the best thing ever! It was purchased by the Indianapolis-Marion County Public Library for their summer reading program titled, “Gear Up!” The different branches within that library system used their fabric to decorate the libraries, and they're going to hold a contest for the best decorations. I couldn’t have asked for a better use of my fabric! I’m a chronic reader and libraries hold a dear spot in my heart. It inspires me to think about young readers expanding their horizons with a combo of graphic art and literature. Here's a photo of one of the displays. When I get photos of all of them, I’ll post them to my blog.
Do you sew yourself? Do you try to imagine how someone might use your designs when you’re working on something new?
I do sew! My mom began teaching me when I was knee-high to a grasshopper. In a past career I was the costumer and stage manager for a civic light opera and when my kids were small, I was their Halloween costume master! I absolutely consider end use, and I think it’s critical to imagine how your design will work for the end use. I really enjoy creating novelty fabrics for quilters on one end of the spectrum, and designing for crafts or decor on the other. I also think about what I don’t see in fabric stores. I want to produce things that are sometimes a little quirkly or humorous and that will stand out as slightly different. That’s why you’ll see in my Spoonflower shop bacon, armadillos, steampunk squids, roller derby, hedgies, a honey badger, scooters, and trailers as a few examples. It’s also fabulous that I can offer different media on fabric. I have watercolor designs, photographic designs, crayon or colored pencil designs, and computer generated designs.
What other sorts of creative projects do you enjoy? Do you and your family do creative or crafty things together?
I’m a beader and you can see some of my work on my old beading blog. I also sew, paint watercolors, knit, crochet, embroider, string beads, create stained glass, do mosaics... you name, it I’ve done it! Mostly my family lets me do all the crafty things while they all play musical instruments or sing. We enjoy making music together (although we're not Partridge Family types), and we also enjoy going to plays and concerts together. Oh, and eating...we have a lot of creative conversations while noshing together!
You’ve entered quite a few of the Spoonflower fabric-of-the-week contests and have won three of them, the desert, woodland creatures, and leprechauns contests. What’s been your favorite contest theme so far and why did you enjoy it?
Oh, good question! I’ve really enjoyed the ones that I’ve won or where I placed in the Top 10, but really I so enjoy the challenge of almost every single contest. The contests make me stretch artistically and challenge me to make more interesting designs quickly. I owe a huge debt of gratitude to Spoonflower and its thousands of followers. I cut my artistic teeth on your site and the encouragement that others have given me provided me with the courage to put my stuff out there for everyone to judge. I’ve thoroughly enjoyed this ever-changing process over the last 3 years.
Do you have any other design collections in the works that you’d care to share with us?
Yes, I do! I’ve just released my Mod Scooters and Sidecars collection and my new Americana collection. I’m currently working on creating a collection for my focal design, Mātuhi - the New Zealand Bush Wren. If anyone out there is looking at one of my designs and wants a collection to go with it, just send me an email. Let's talk!
Thanks, Virginia! And now if all this talk of fabric collections has whetted your hunger to build your stash, we think you'll be pretty darn excited about this week's giveaway. The kind folks at Connecting Threads have provided us with a generous five fat quarter bundles of Virginia's entire new Hello Sunshine collection to give away--that's 19 different prints for five lucky folks! To sweeten an already awesome giveaway, we're also including 5 of Virginia's Spoonflower designs, hand-picked by Virginia herself: "Small Bacon," "Armadillos Wandering the Desert...", "Matuhi - the New Zealand Bush Wren," "Paisley Ahoy Koi, Oh Boy," and her "Hi, Ho, a Merry-O" bunting kit.
To enter this giveaway for a big ol' stack of fabrics, just leave your comment below or on the corresponding Facebook post, and do include your Spoonflower screen name or some other means of tracking you down in case you're one of our five winners. Entries close next Tuesday, 8/21 and we'll announce a winner on 8/22. Good luck, fabric stashers!
Last week, we offered a giveaway that a lot of you seem to have been really excited about. We offered up Meg McElwhee's lovely new Ashland dress pattern plus four yards of Spoonflower fabric to make it up in. The winner of that giveaway was Jennifer Pagliai. Congratulations, Jennifer! I hope you sew up something beautiful!
This week, Spoonflower designer and paper collage artist, Sally Harmon (aka, Boris_Thumbkin), shares a tutorial on how to create a collection of fabric designs out of a single large paper collage. We're in awe of Sally's low-tech, approachable design technique which uses only scissors, paper, a camera, and the editing tools available right here on the Spoonflower site. Read on for the full tutorial below!
The process I show here is just one of many ways that you can create a whole collection of fabric designs from a cut paper collage. It's a method that works for me because it's low-tech, low overhead, low pressure, and no-stick since there's no glue involved. WIth a little luck, you can create an entire collection of fabric designs sharing colors, shapes, and motifs!
1. Collect Paper. For all but the largest and most intricate shapes I like to use paint chips from a hardware or home improvement store. They're free, they're colorful, and they lay relatively flat.
2. Cut the Paper Into Shapes. First, trim any writing off the paint chips. Then just start cutting out shapes! I try to do a mix of shapes: geometric and organic, large and small, vertically- and horizontally-oriented, etc. Simple shapes can be cut freehand or, if you want some fancier shapes, try drawing them on the back of the paint chips first and then cutting them out.
Shapes with parts inaccessible to scissors can be cut out using an X-Acto knife fitted with a #15 blade and a cutting mat or board. Change the blade frequently and don't rush or worry too much. Most mistakes can be repaired later and some turn out not to have been mistakes after all!
3. Lay Out The Cut Shapes to Create a Collage. I lay my shapes out onto sheets of 20"x30" foamcore. These are good because they're stiff enough to carry around in case I need to move my collage while working on it. Some of the black ones reverse to white so you get two background colors in one piece. And, if I lay out a composition that I end up really liking, I can rubber-cement the pieces down. The 20 x 30 inch size is easily photographed and if I do decide to keep it permanently, it's also easily framed.
Here's my first pass. Although I'm underwhelmed by the composition as a whole, I think parts of it will probably work well as fabric designs.
Continue reading "Tutorial: How to Create a Fabric Design Collection From a Paper Collage" »
The participants this week are:
1. Muñeca Flamenca by mariao
2. "Arwen" travel doll pattern by minimiel
3. "Florabutton_Posy" Headband or Sash Kit by fireflower
4. "Wish You Were Here" hand-made Michigan mitt/potholder by saltlabs
5. "Wishing You Were Here" Owls - Fat Quarter Collection of 5 owls by amy_lou_who
6. 1 Fairy Doll, a Cat & Fairy Softies by de-ann_black
7. 1/2 A Dozen Roses - Spots & Stripes Cut 'n' Sew by nezumiworld
8. 4 Baby Sandals by dinorahdesign
9. A Rock Star "wish you were here!" by paragonstudios
10. Amelia and her kittens by stacyiesthsu
Continue reading "Cut & Sew Projects for Etsy's World Craft Party - Vote for your favorites!" »
For the second time this year, San Diego-based textile designer Cheyanne Sammons steps onto the winning stage of our Fabric of the Week contest, this time with her cheerful "Flying Ace" design (her previous win came in the "What's the New Owl" contest this past spring). Congratulations to her and to all the other participating designers in our aviation fabric contest!
The final voting results:
1. 488 votes for flying ace by cheyanne_sammons
2. 479 votes for candy sky by scrummy
3. 461 votes for Adventure Par Avion by spellstone
4. 440 votes for Aeronautical dreams by cjldesigns
5. 403 votes for Aviation Flotation by bzbdesigner
6. 365 votes for Sweet Dreams by kimsa
7. 362 votes for The Aeroplane Flies High by snailuna
8. 333 votes for A Nostalgic Voyage by licoricelove
9. 324 votes for Par Avion by jennartdesigns
10. 308 votes for balloons_map_pattern by lusyspoon
We're absolutely thrilled to have collaborated this week with fellow North Carolina resident, pattern designer, blogger, and author Meg McElwee to bring you a great giveaway. For those of you who aren't familiar with this talented sewist, Meg has written two very popular sewing books, Sew Liberated: 20 Stylish Projects for the Modern Sewist and Growing Up Sew Liberated: Making Handmade Clothes and Projects for Your Creative Child, both stuffed with lovely project ideas and photos. I'm a particular fan of Growing Up Sew Liberated which draws heavily on Meg's experience as a Montessori teacher. The sewing projects in this book are interspersed with great ideas from Meg on how to involve children in everyday tasks at home, from cleaning up to cooking to garening, not to mention how to foster kids' creative play both inside the house and out. My girls saw the play teepee on the front cover of this book and immediately began clamoring for their own little hidey nook.
Besides authoring these two lovely books, Meg is also a talented sewing pattern designer with lines of women's and children's clothing and accessories available through her Sew Liberated pattern shop. Meg's most recently released pattern--and her first dress pattern!--is the Ashland Dress Pattern which comes in US sizes 2-20 and includes separate pattern pieces for bust sizes A-D. Meg says that the Ashland can also be made up as a tunic by simply shortening the skirt to the desired length. She's photographed here in a simplified tunic version made up in Spoonflower cotton/silk printed with Holli Zollinger's "Grey and White Diamond Linen" design. Meg told us, "I love that this will be a versatile top; I can wear it in summer and it will keep on working through winter with the help of a cardigan. The cotton/silk fabric has a sheen to it, so the top can easily be dressed up for a night on the town." We think it's lovely.
Meg kindly agreed to an interview with us about the inspiration behind her sewing and pattern design, and I hope you find it as interesting as I did. Read on for more about Meg plus a giveaway below!
You started your pattern designing life creating patterns for accessories. What made you want to start designing clothing patterns?
When I rediscovered my childhood interest in sewing, I started out with easy patterns and worked my way up to garment sewing. It wasn’t until I was living in rural Mexico and didn’t have access to any clothing stores or commercial patterns that I started designing and sewing my own clothes. You could say that I became a designer by necessity, but the truth is that I truly enjoyed the time I spent trying to figure out how to create a certain look, and I loved the uniqueness of the garments that I was able to add to my own closet.
What factors do you consider when designing a new garment? Do you have a particular person or type of person in mind when you’re beginning work on a new pattern, or a particular task or place it might be worn?
Perhaps this reveals a certain selfishness, but I design for myself. Which means, of course, that I design for others with whom I share similarities: women who are practical in their clothing needs, yet enjoy looking nice – artistically styled, shall we say. As a mother of young children, I need for my clothing to be comfortable, hard-wearing, and able to transition from grocery store to park to the (occasional!) date night with my husband. I try to keep nursing moms in mind in many of my designs, and I strive to make the construction of the garment accessible for all levels of sewists.
What is the most challenging aspect for you in designing a clothing pattern?
When designing a clothing pattern, the biggest challenge is assessing fit. A design will look very different on different body types, so I try to stick to designs that I know will flatter most bodies. At Sew Liberated, we’ve addressed some of the challenges of fit by making our most recent pattern, the Ashland Dress, with bust-specific sizing. Each pattern comes with custom cup sizes from A-D, making the sewing process much less time-consuming, and assuring a flattering fit for most women.
What are your personal favorite fabric types for clothing sewing?
I love working with knits because of their forgiving nature – they are easy to fit, many drape beautifully, and they provide a fantastic foundation for your wardrobe. Learning how to make the perfect t-shirt was a groundbreaking day for me! So many possibilities for giving your wardrobe a comfortable upgrade! I love Spoonflower’s interlock knit base – with it, you can get really creative with knits, because cool knit fabric prints are hard to come by elsewhere!
What articles of clothing to you find yourself making again and again, whether for yourself or for your family?
T-shirts, definitely. Closely followed by yoga pants, the Paloma Top, and baby pants. Perhaps it’s because I’ve been preparing to teach a course on sewing with knits with Craftsy, titled Sewing with Knit Fabrics: Five Wardrobe Essentials, due out in mid-August. But even if I hadn’t been approached to teach the class, I would have gathered quite the collection of knitwear anyway.
What do you think has been your most successful garment pattern so far in terms of your original vision coming to fruition? How about in terms of feedback from others?
The Ashland Dress is my personal rock star. I had the vision in my head, then on paper, and it took a good amount of tweaking until it truly lived up to the vision. It’s a dress (which can be made into a tunic, as shown) that has fabulous and forgiving shaping and great skill-building details like invisible zipper installation and side seam pockets.
Sew Liberated’s all-time favorite garment pattern has certainly been the Schoolhouse Tunic. It’s the best pattern for starting off on your garment sewing adventures. You’ll come out with a finished product that’s really timeless and chic, and with minimal difficulties at the sewing machine. People just love their Schoolhouse Tunics – most seem unable to stop at just one, which is a great sign!
Is there anyone whose personal style you really admire and take inspiration from?
I get a kick out of style blogs that seamlessly meld vintage finds with a modern wardrobe--dresses with knee-high, distressed leather boots, a flowy top with comfortable stretch pants. I’d say that my style is an eclectic mix of the feminine and the lumberjack, vintage florals and subdued euro-chic solids.
Are there any new patterns or projects in the works that we should look forward to seeing from you?
Yes! I have a fall collection coming out in October, which will include a dress, a top, a pair of stretch denim pants, a harvesting apron and a beautiful quilt – Sew Liberated’s first quilt pattern. It’s going to be a busy late summer!
Thanks, Meg! And now for your chance to win a copy of Meg's Ashland Dress Pattern, plus four yards of the Spoonflower fabric of your choice to make it up in! To enter this giveaway, just leave your comment below or on the corresponding Facebook post, and do include your Spoonflower screen name or other means of finding you in case you're our winner. Have you ever made one of Meg's other Sew Liberated patterns? We'd love to hear about it in your comment. This giveaway closes next Tuesday, 8/14 and we'll announce a winner on 8/15. Good luck to you all!
Last week, we gave away a copy of Robin Houghton's Blogging for Creatives, an approachable guide to the blogosphere. The winner was Douglas Peterson, who blogs about ducks and the other inhabitants of his local millpond in Brighton Michigan at Words4It. Congratulations, Doug!
This week Anda Corrie from Etsy shares a tutorial for making a kid's art smock. She made one using fabric created from her daughter's own drawings! For more on how to turn drawings into fabric designs, check out Anda's previous Photoshop tutorial.
This tutorial will show you how to create a very basic pattern and then sew a simple art smock for your child. In this example I’ve first created Spoonflower fabric based off my daughter’s artwork — the techniques I describe in this tutorial might be helpful if you want to do something similar.
Materials:
How-To: Tape two pieces of paper together along their long edge. If your child is older than 4 you may need to tape more pieces together — or just rustle up some bigger paper.
Get a shirt that fits your child comfortably and lay it flat on the paper. Line up the center of the shirt to run along the longest side of your paper.
Trace around neckline, shoulder, side, and bottom. Lift up the sleeve a bit and carefully trace along sleeve seam. Now add ½” seam allowance at shoulder and an extra inch to the side, as shown in the photo.
Cut two pieces of your main fabric from this pattern. On your pattern piece, measure 5” from bottom and draw a straight horizontal line, then cut off that part. This is for your pocket.
Cut one piece of pocket fabric on fold — it can be the same fabric or choose a different fabric.
Sew bias tape along top edge of pocket piece.
Line up pocket to bottom of front piece, pin and then baste around the edges to hold it in place.
Measure halfway point and sew a perpendicular straight stitch to connect pocket at center as shown (creating two pockets).
Sew shoulders. Use a serger if you have one but a straight stitch will do fine. I like to use French seams* purely because they look nice.
*French seams in a nutshell: with fabric wrong side together, sew a straight stitch using a ¼” seam. Trim fabric as close as you can to where you’ve sewn. Press down seam and turn smock inside out so right sides are together. Now sew a ⅜” seam and press. The seam is now hidden and looks very smart, I think! This technique is more often used for delicate fabrics like silk... but to me they make everything look better.
Open up smock, measure to center of front neckline and cut a 4” slit.
Carefully sew bias tape around slit.
Now measure 36” of bias tape and sew around neckline, leaving about 8” at each end. Those 8” ends will become the tie at the neckline.
Sew bias tape around (open) sleeves.
Sew up the sides of smock. Again, you can use a serger, a straight stitch, or French seams as I’ve done in the photos.
Turn smock right-side out again and sew the last of your bias tape around the bottom to hem the smock. You’re all done!
Anda Corrie is an American illustrator, Etsy designer, and émigré living in Berlin, Germany with her small family. In her spare time she obsesses over vintage children’s books, makes homemade schnapps, sews tiny dresses that her 4-year-old stubbornly refuses to wear, and draws. Visit her Spoonflower shop for some lovely hand drawn fabric designs and her Etsy shop, Boosterseat.
Our intrepid designers this week are:
1. I love flying by juliagrifol
2. 1 Aircraft Design for 2 Cushions by de-ann_black_author
3. 120730_aviation-balloon1 by d'lee-d'laa
4. 8helis by blumenlimonade
5. A Nostalgic Voyage by licoricelove
6. Adventure Par Avion by spellstone
7. Aero by glimmericks
8. Aero Teddy Bear 1 by jenithea
9. Aeronautical dreams by cjldesigns
10. Aeroplanes pink by sydama
Continue reading "Fanciful Flying Fabrics: Our Aviation Contest" »
Would that fabric design were indeed an Olympic event! In our own competition to celebrate the spirit of the games, we've still managed to assemble an impressively international podium. If this week's contest had been an Olympic event, the gold would have gone to Germany (Tabula Rosi), silver to Australia (cjldesigns) and bronze to team USA (bzbdesigner). Check out the top ten Olympic-inspired fabric designs.
For the real sports fans among you, the final scores were:
1. 738 votes for london-games by tabula_rosi
2. 676 votes for Jump Leap Plunge by cjldesigns
3. 486 votes for SUDOKU OLYMPICS by bzbdesigner
4. 377 votes for Birdlympics! by jennartdesigns
5. 369 votes for Olympic_energy by chicca_besso
6. 355 votes for TeacupOlympics2 by kimnb
7. 340 votes for Venues of Victory by sammyk
8. 330 votes for London Olympics by theboutiquestudio
9. 312 votes for Olympic Chequerboard by ebygomm
10. 308 votes for Gymnastics Love by bojudesigns
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