Designing means New Fabrics!

As of January, Spoonflower has just stepped up the game when it comes to fabric designs by the independent artist community!  Artists no longer have to purchase sample fabric proofs, wait for them to arrive by mail and once approved, offer them for sale through the Spoonflower website.  Artist can now use Spoonflower's online digital proofing tool to detect any design flaws and resubmit revised files to make them immediately available for sale to the public.  This most definitely provides a bit of financial relief for independent designers with limited budgets and helps better detect problematic design issues that may have otherwise gone undetected.  To read more about how changes at Spoonflower impacts artists, here's a very well written article by Craft Industry Alliance  that you should check out. 

The Designing Process

Back in the early 90's, I was offered a unique opportunity to work with the Balson-Hercules Group (later became Balson Erlanger) who licensed my designs for retail fabric collections and medical scrubs. When I first started, designs had to be handpainted on artboard, painted with gouache, outlined in ink and then submitted by courier for revisions.  Color palettes were prohibitive as the more colors used, the more expensive it was to manufacture.  Once digital art became the standard it was easier to submit designs and make immediate revisions without involving the cost for art supplies and postal fees.  Today, commercial digital printing equipment has pretty much taken center stage and when Spoonflower offered their on demand printing services I jumped at the opportunity.  In 2021, Shutterfly acquired Spoonflower and the transition went quite smoothly since they kept the established Spoonflower brand.  If you'd like to take a step inside the Spoonflower factory, you should check out Sophia's Decor Blog as she walks you through the process. As for my future in textile design, I plan to keep my Photoshop busy and my Spoonflower Store well stocked with new and exciting designs.  Drop by regularly to see what's new and you'll always find flash sales displayed when available. I hope you enjoy shopping for my fabrics as much as I love creating them for you!