New Fabric Patterns: Bunny Sunday & Nancy Flora

Since the beginning of the Summer I've been in a different work mode. No more murals. No more side jobs. No more plushes. Etc., etc., etc. It was a difficult, slightly squeamish decision but a good one. So what am I doing with my time (besides being with Bird full time save for a morning of babysitting 1x a week)? Well, thanks for asking! I'm finally working on fabric again. It's a wonderful exciting feeling. I'm meeting awesome fabric peeps on twitter & by visiting inspiring blogs and am trying to steep myself in the world of textile design once again. It really was a LONG time ago now that I was in school for textiles. I graduated in 2000 from RISD and it was only in my final year there that I did any textile work on the computer (using CAD for textiles) and only in my very last semester of school that I used Photoshop & Illustrator. Wow, that makes me feel kind of old :0

Flash forward to today...what isn't on the computer?? Really, the most important consideration is how much easier it is now to be a designer of textiles. I felt so stymied after school without a fancy CAD system. There was no way I could work freelance without having a space for hand screen printing fabrics (which I really wanted but never pulled off fully) or some kind of computer design support (which didn't really exist, at least not to me at that time).

Now we have amazing companies like Spoonflower (and Fabric on Demand which I haven't tried yet, as well as other companies - check out True Up's post on this topic) that enable you to easily print whatever you want to on fabric.

Last month I designed a pattern called Nancy Flora (Nancy is a city in France we fell in love with while visiting family). I definitely have some disconnect with the colors, and I feel squidgy about the pattern - it's not quite right, not balanced. It's also possible that the scale is off. But no worries, I'm moving ahead! It's so important for me right now to just KEEP GOING! There are so many distractions in my life as it is. Better to just keep being fresh, current, and inspired by a new day.

Black & white sketch


Sketch colored in Photoshop


Fat quarter of Nancy Flora, printed with Spoonflower on quilting cotton

2 printed samples of Nancy Flora, one on linen cotton canvas & the other on upholstery weight twill. There was a little oops! at the factory I believe but an understandable one - the samples were printed from two different files (with very slightly different color variations) so it's difficult to compare them based on base cloth.

I've been working on a new pattern called Bunny Sunday. This is a watercolor sketch that I scanned into the computer and then did modifications on in Photoshop.

Loving blues & peach lately

My original watercolor painting of the pattern

Bunny Sunday, in the blue & peach repeat

I'm still not sure what scale this should be...teeny tiny to match all the teeny details? Or each running bunny at 2 or 3 inches long? I'm also admittedly not satisfied with the current repeat...I think I'm just over complicating things. I may revisit. After starting a new pattern. Really - have to keep going with this momentum.

The most exciting news however (!) and definitely to feed the momentum is that I was moved from the waiting list onto the enrolled list for Heather Ross's class in Portland later in the month. It's a 3 day class focusing on exactly what I've been working on - creating textile designs using Photoshop and printing with an on-demand printer (we'll be using Spoonflower).

Pinch me!!

I feel so grateful.

Tthanks for stopping by. Feel free to leave me a comment and let me know what you think about the new designs. If you sew/craft what would you use these fabrics for?

hugs, Devon