{"id":392,"date":"2013-01-01T14:53:10","date_gmt":"2013-01-01T21:53:10","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/childerhouseblog.com\/?p=392"},"modified":"2013-01-05T10:23:25","modified_gmt":"2013-01-05T17:23:25","slug":"how-to-print-your-own-fabric-with-a-potato","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/childerhouseblog.com\/?p=392","title":{"rendered":"how to print your own fabric with a potato"},"content":{"rendered":"

I’ve got a few fabric-printing techniques under my belt, each with its own drawbacks, benefits, and results. Screen printing is a good way to cleanly and uniformly print a lot of a complex design at once, but never seems to be a good option for last-minute projects because our photo-emulsion is somehow perpetually expired. It’s also a bit more complicated and involved, since there are many steps to go through to produce a good screen and then print with it accurately, so it’s not the most economical option for really simple projects. Freezer paper stencils<\/a> can produce a print similar to that of a silk screen, but can only be used once– and depending on the complexity of the design, they can take a while to make. Stamping fabric to produce a design takes just a tad longer than the time you spend carving the stamp, which, if you’re using a potato, could take just a minute. Printing with stamps is not typically clean– there tend to be artifacts like smudges and drips, too much or not enough paint, and it can be hard to achieve a lot of detail. It’s this imperfection that I find charming and lovely, and that’s why I decided to stamp some fabric.<\/p>\n

\"all<\/a>All you need to to print your own fabric is something to print on, something to print with, and some ink.<\/p>\n

– My plan was to make tote bags with a simple triangle print in three different colorways, and since I already had a lot of nice bottom weight cotton on hand, I decided to just make my own rather than drive to the store to buy blank bags. I cut out the pieces for each bag before printing them so I’d have no wasted fabric.
\n– You can find a myriad of excellent stamp-making options at your typical craft store, but if your design is simple and you don’t care about saving your stamp, a potato’s the way to go. It’s cheap, biodegradable, and if you mess up while carving it, you can just slice a little off and start over.
\n– I used a screen-printing ink I had on hand, but I’d imagine fabric paint would work too. Regular old acrylic paint might do in a pinch, but won’t hold up as well to washing and will crack and chip over time.<\/p>\n

First, make sure whatever you’re printing on is clean and ready to go. I used this tutorial<\/a> to make my tote bags, and had each piece cut and the components of each bag organized before I started. Next, carve your stamp:<\/p>\n

\"potato<\/a>Since I wanted to create a grid of triangles, I used a fabric pen with disappearing ink to draw a single line through the middle of my fabric. This ensured my first row was straight and allowed me to stamp repeating rows of pattern accurately.<\/p>\n

\"potato<\/a>I tried dipping my potato stamp in paint, applying it with a palette knife, and painting it on with a brush; I found that the latter had the most consistent results. After I stamped the first row, I matched up the top corners of the printed triangles with the bottom corners of my stamp, and covered the entire piece of fabric.<\/p>\n

\"all<\/a>The silk screen ink I used needs to be heat-set, so I ironed each piece for a few minutes, then sewed up my bags:<\/p>\n

\"hand-printed<\/a>I love how they turned out, and I’ll definitely use this method again in future projects!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I’ve got a few fabric-printing techniques under my belt, each with its own drawbacks, benefits, and results. Screen printing is a good way to cleanly and uniformly print a lot of a complex design at once, but never seems to … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_active":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_note":"","_exactmetrics_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[15,9],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-392","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-crafts","category-sewing"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/childerhouseblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/392","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/childerhouseblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/childerhouseblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/childerhouseblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/childerhouseblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=392"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/childerhouseblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/392\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/childerhouseblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=392"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/childerhouseblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=392"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/childerhouseblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=392"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}