I have been taking a screenprinting class this fall.  I've learned to create designs on vellum and then burn them onto the screen with photo emulsion and ultraviolet light.  Then printing with single color and multiple colors.

designing for t-shirts

 Printing cabbage rose for a textle repeat

mixing paint colors with base

Wonderfully spacious printing space!

working on multi colored repeat

designing artwork to be printed

more textile repeat

to dry textile that has been printed

 squigees to push through the mesh - many sizes!

machine for printing t-shirts

David, the assistant in front of the screen dryers

power sprayers to wash out the screens and squeegees.

prof. looking over artwork

This has been a fun class - and it really complements my photoshop class very well!

Here are my first 4 blocks for a king sized quilt I want to make.  I've been wanting to make one for my bed for awhile now but have been worried about quilting a king sized one.  I decided to just start piecing the top.  I still don't know how I will fit a king size quilt on my home sewing machine but I will think about this later.  Perhaps i'll just have it quilted by someone with a long arm machine.

I decided to make my blocks using mostly solid fabrics.  Solids I am using are: Shot cotton, Kona Ash, Coal, Medium grey and Tomato.  Printed fabrics are Lotta Jansdotter, Kumiko Fujita, American Jane print, Neptune, Hope Valley.  These blocks are improvisational in that I just start cutting fabric and piecing together whatever I have available around me.  Each block, however, will be approximately 17" unfinished.  I am thinking about just piecing each block together the way they are or possibly adding white sashing.  I haven't decided yet.  But I do have 11 blocks finished so far and I do like the way they look together!

I am taking a couple of textile design classes at FIT this semester.  First is Photoshop and the second is screen printing.  I am enjoying both very much - although I find Photoshop a bit challenging as there are a lot of technical terms I need to memorize!  My first assignment for the photoshop class is to create a tile design using photoshop to flip and rotate the image.  Finished product is 8"x10" image that will have 20 2" blocks.

Above drawing is my original that I began with.

Then I selected a 2" square to work with.

Then using the 2" image, I created a 4" by copying the image onto a new document.  Now I can play around with any of the 4 2" square by rotating it 90 degrees or 180 degrees.

Here are the three that I made for my assignment:

It was a fun project and I am happy with the way each came out so differently!

Awhile back, I signed up for a talk given by Tula Pink at my LQS - City Quilter's. I'm so glad I did because her talk last night was so enjoyable. She gave an 1.5 hour presentation of her previous lines with Moda and Free Spirit (as well as her upcoming line - Salt Water) and her ideas for her designs. She talked about the steps she goes through to come up with her ideas. She begins with a pencil sketch on grid vellum paper. She draws just a portion of the whole idea because it is then flipped and mirrored on fabric to create her beautiful damask designs such as the owl from Full Moon Forest and Hushabye and the frog in Prince Charming. She also uses Illustrator to input her ideas into the computer. She also talked about how about 6 years ago, there weren't any interesting "modern" fabrics except for kaffe Fasset and Amy Butler and with her interest in screen printing, she decided to design her own fabric. within just hours of uploading her designs on her blog, Moda contacted her to do a line of fabric and that's how she got started!

Tula was charming and it was fun to see her ideas on paper as well as to see some of her beautiful quilts completed (she doesn't quilt herself but she does piece everything herself).

Here is my first quilt as you go quilt.  I finished quilting all the blocks and they are all ready to put together.  I used Joel Dewberry fabric called Modern Meadow.  It was from a few years ago.  Each block has been trimmed down to 6.5" and will be 6" finished.  I used mostly solid prints for the backing.  I'll post a photo of the back once I stitch all the blocks together.  Each block will be sewn as if I am piecing a quilt top.  Once finished, excess batting can be trimmed off to make it less bulky in the seams.  But because I used the thinnest Dream batting (Request), it really won't be that bulky.  I love this line of batting the best.  It is the softest batting made out of 100% cotton and super thin.

It took me awhile but I finally decided on the fabric for the binding.  It is the red dot print from Amy Butler's Lotus line.  I love binding with polka dot fabric.  I like to bind quilts with a colorful graphic print so I have a stash of polka dot fabric and others that are chosen for that in mind.

Quilt back has strips of prints plus Ash solid from Robert Kaufman Kona.

I am currently finishing up the quilt as you go blocks that I started at the beginning of summer.  It is almost all done - last few blocks to do.  I decided to add the blue botanical print from Moda Cake Rock Beach by Joelle Hoverson.  It is not a recent line - it's from a few years ago.  I lucked out awhile back when I stopped by Purl and saw a bolt of this fabric!  The blue is beautiful.

I can't vacation in Cape Cod without going to one of my favorite quilt shops.  I had a little time today after dropping my son off at camp so I made it over to the quilt shop.  Most of there selection is traditional but they do carry some designer fabrics and a few Japanese prints.  They have a whole room with fabrics that are discounted as well as a big section with books.

 I found some old favorites too!