Spoonflower’s Weekly Design Challenges encourage creativity by inviting our community to submit designs around a theme and vote on favorites to win weekly prizes. See what design challenges are coming up and which designers were crowned grand-champion in past challenges here. This month we’re challenging you to design for one of our most popular productstea towels!

Like previous years, all tea towel challenge entries will automatically be previewed on a Spoonflower Tea Towel during voting. Jump ahead to learn more about the ins and outs of formatting your entry to ensure a picture-perfect preview.

2021 Tea Towel Calendar | Entries due by September 22

2021 Tea Towel Calendar | Entries due by September 22 | Spoonflower Blog

This week kicks off a month of Spoonflower’s annual tea towel competitions with a classic crowd favorite, 2021 Calendar Tea Towels. It’s fun to dream about what possibilities a bright new year can usher in and that may be a starting place to inspire a motif for your calendar entry. The art you create is entirely up to you and if you need a calendar file to get started, click here!

Have a calendar tea towel design from last year in your design library? It can’t be submitted for this weekly challenge, but it’s a good reminder to upload a revision with 2021’s dates for future customers. Cheers to a new year ahead!

Designer tip: The Spoonflower community is worldwide! We recommend offering your calendar in different languages—the version you enter in the challenge is up to you. Click here to download French, Spanish, German and English calendars.  

Entries will be submitted at the Linen Cotton Canvas fat quarter size (27″ x 18”) and previewed on a Spoonflower Tea Towel. Submissions close September 22  at 3 p.m. Eastern Time. Voting begins September 24. Winners will be announced October 1. See official rules.

ABCs of… Tea Towel | Entries due by September 29

ABCs of... Tea Towel | Entries due by September 29 | Spoonflower Blog

For many families this year the classroom is looking a bit different. Help parents bring learning into the home with an original tea towel design inspired by the ABCs in the theme of your choice. Will you create the ABCs of the Rainforest? Or will you be inspired by an underwater landscape? We’re excited to see how you make learning fun and beautiful with your ABCs of… whatever you like! Spoonflower serves a global audience so don’t shy away from creating your alphabet in a non-English language if you prefer. 

Entries will be submitted at the Linen Cotton Canvas fat quarter size (27″ x 18”) and previewed on a Spoonflower Tea Towel. Submissions close September 29 at 3 p.m. Eastern Time. Voting begins October 1 Winners will be announced October 8. See official rules.

Kitchen Wisdom Tea Towel | Entries due by October 6

Kitchen Wisdom Tea Towel | Entries due by October 6 | Spoonflower Blog

How many teaspoons are in a tablespoon? Is mayo a good substitute for eggs? What’s the optimal brew time for my oolong tea? Do you find yourself asking endless questions while working in the kitchen? What if you had a kitchen tea towel handy with all the answers? We’re looking for tea towel cheat sheets to empower home cooks to tackle common questions from conversion charts to temperature help to ingredient identification. For this challenge, you’ll find a balance of form and function as you organize the info in a way that’s both visually appealing and easily digestible (pun intended).

Entries will be submitted at the Linen Cotton Canvas fat quarter size (27″ x 18”) and previewed on a Spoonflower Tea Towel. Submissions close October 6 at 3 p.m. Eastern Time. Voting begins October 8 Winners will be announced October 15. See official rules.

Backyard Winter Birds Tea Towel | Entries due by October 13

Backyard Winter Birds Tea Towel | Entries due by October 13 | Spoonflower Blog

What’s showing up at the backyard bird feeders in your part of the world during winter? Whether your migratory birds have flown south and you’re enjoying the “locals”, or colorful new species are making an appearance, create a tea towel design that showcases the avian arrivals gracing your winter landscape. 

Entries will be submitted at the Linen Cotton Canvas fat quarter size (27″ x 18”) and previewed on a Spoonflower Tea Towel. Submissions close October 13 at 3 p.m. Eastern Time. Voting begins October 15 Winners will be announced October 22. See official rules.

Vintage Travel Tea Towel | Entries due by October 20

Vintage Travel Tea Towel | Entries due by October 20 | Spoonflower Blog

We are feeling the travel bug pretty hard these days! If you could dream up anywhere to go, where would it be? We’d love to see you get inspired by vintage national park posters, but think outside of the box—maybe you dream of going to space and traveling to Mars, or you want to climb Machu Picchu or get lost in Antelope Canyon. What would your vacation travel destination poster look like? From real to imagined—we can’t wait to see where this challenge takes you.

Entries will be submitted at the Linen Cotton Canvas fat quarter size (27″ x 18”) and previewed on a Spoonflower Tea Towel. Submissions close October 20 at 3 p.m. Eastern Time. Voting begins October 22 Winners will be announced October 29. See official rules.

Tea Towel Guidelines

In order to ensure the entirety of your design is captured in a ready-made Spoonflower Tea Towel , we’ve created a guideline that can be followed to ensure great previews and finished tea towels.

A preview of a Linen-Cotton Canvas Fat Quarter on Spoonflower measures 27″ wide x 18″ tall (68.58cm x 45.72cm). A finished, hemmed, Spoonflower Tea Towel measures 16’’ wide x 24’’ tall (40.64cm x 60.96cm). Your design will be automatically rotated 90º clockwise for the Spoonflower tea towel preview. Following the guidelines below will ensure that your design looks beautiful as both an unfinished Linen Cotton Canvas fat quarter as well as a finished tea towel. Need a little help? Download the Spoonflower Tea Towel template here and see our guidelines below.

Measurements based off of a yard of Linen Cotton Canvas

QUICK TIPS

  • Orient your design so that the top of the design is the left side of the design file.
  • Let the background color or pattern extend all the way to the edges!
  • Keep main design details like calendar dates within the safe area (14.5″ x 22.5″) to ensure they don’t get cut off or sewn over.

If you still have questions about our tea towel design challenges, send us an email at [email protected]!

Grand Prize

1st place winner will receive a $200 Spoonflower credit and one (1) Spoonflower tea towel in their own winning design ($17 value).

Second Place

2nd place winner will receive a $100 Spoonflower credit and one (1)Spoonflower tea towel in their own winning design ($17 value).

Third Place

3rd place winner will receive a $50 Spoonflower credit and one (1) Spoonflower tea towel in their own winning design ($17 value).

The rest of the top 10

Remaining top 10 designs will receive a $20 Spoonflower credit one (1) Spoonflower tea towel in their own winning design ($17 value).

All of the top 50

The top 50 popularly-voted designs from each theme will be automatically made available for sale in the Spoonflower Marketplace (provided they are a verified seller) where they will receive a 10% commission on every sale — no $5 swatch required.