pond_ripple's Fabric Blog

I originally found the pattern for the Undercover Maker Mat on Pinterest, and have finally managed to finish sewing my own! It comes from the blog lillyella by Nicole Young and you can see her post and get free pattern HERE . The mat doubles as both a sewing machine cover and a pocket filled organizer to keep all your notions et cetera at hand as you work. This was a bit of a stash busting project, which required a bit of editing from the pattern. This was almost entirely made up of test swatches which are approximately 8" x 8". The obvious thing  to do was try and break each swatch down into blocks of 4" x 4", but since they end up being slightly less than that, I decided to do a bit of fussy cutting to make 2 slightly larger blocks using the unprinted white space to remain attached in the seam allowance. Here is my rough plan of how to assemble my new pattern. The dimensions changed to 20" x 28" for each side before sewing and seam ...

Photo by John Morgan Designers, YOU DID IT!  For 15 days we've seen many of you set aside at least 15 minutes of your day to devote to creativity. With the guidance of designers from the Spoonflower community, you've sketched in pencil, you've learned block printing and traditional Japanese shibori, you tackled steampunk and kawaii styles, and, hopefully, you've gained the confidence of knowing there's no medium you can't take on. If you haven't yet, be sure to scroll through the #SFDesignADay hashtag on Instagram, Facebook and Twitter – I know you will be as inspired as we are by the incredible talent of this community. We are so proud!    See what others have created Our prompt for today is Designer's Choice! Take a moment today to dig into your favorite prompt from the series or to dust off an old favorite. It's the perfect day to let the creativity you've cultivated during the challenge run wild! We...

We're in the home stretch of our Design-A-Day SpoonChallenge! Are you hanging in there? Today's #SFDesignADay comes to you from 2014 Spoonflower Staff Challenge Winner,  Allie Tate , head of marketing at Spoonflower in Berlin. Allie knows better than most that you needn't look further than the contents of your junk drawer at home to create an award-winning surface pattern.  Allie:  Surface design doesn't have to be complicated. It can be as simple as using everyday objects laying around your home to create a compelling textile design. Find inspiration in items you use every day or test your creativity by incorporating unusual items into your fabric design. To create this design, I used materials purchased at a local hardware store as a part of Spoonflower's 2014 Staff Design Challenge. By restricting the tools available (and with just 1 hour to create and upload our designs from start to finish!), we had to really get creative in h...

Inspired by her love of the super cute, today's Design-A-Day SpoonChallenge is brought to you by  Heidi Kenney . Today Heidi gives us a rundown of the history behind this fabulously fun design style along with pointers on the various ways you can make it your own. Ranging from her love of pizza to drawing nuns, she shows us just how versatile kawaii truly is. Be sure to check out more of Heidi's kawaii designs over in the  Spoonflower Marketplace ! Heidi:  Kawaii is a Japanese word that means the quality of being cute or items that are cute. Kawaii began in the 1970s in Japan, when teenage girls began using a cute informal style of writing. It included hearts, smiling faces, and doodles and was seen as a rise against traditional Japanese culture. Kawaii has grown from a small teenage rebellion into an huge part of Japanese culture. In Japan today, you can see the kawaii influence everywhere, from adorable items you might expect ...

As we begin to come to the close of the Design-A-Day SpoonChallenge we can't leave out one of our most important techniques: Typographical!  Amy Peppler Adams, better known as  pennycandy  in the  Spoonflower Marketplace , shares with us why this technique is fabulous (and easy) for new Spoonflower users and veterans alike.  Amy:  When I found Spoonflower about six years ago, I was coming from a graphic design background. The first several prints I uploaded were typography based because it seemed like the easiest way to transition into what was, for me, the whole new world of surface design. To this day, I still use type in the majority of my work, and often try to include at least one text-based design in each collection. But you don't need an art degree to experiment with and enjoy using typography in your designs. Here are a few ways anyone can have fun with type. Word Puzzles One of my favorite ways to use t...