As I have mentioned in an earlier post, when I was a kid my mom had a small home based business making screen printed T shirts with graphic images of many punk bands of the time.
I remember her constructing her screens from scratch with pieces of wood and stretching silk over them, stapling them down. She would take over the bathroom of our old Los Angeles bungalow and tape the windows shut with black fabric, creating a small darkroom while she exposed the screens in there.
The other day I got a book in the mail from Lark Crafts called
PRINTING ON FABRIC by the textile print artist Jen Swearington to review. Printing On Fabric explains everything you would want to know about making your own screens and mixing your own inks.
I contacted Lark Crafts to see if they would offer up another copy for a giveaway here on Sew Country Chick and they agreed to! This is one book that I am going to
USE and I know that if you are interested in learning about making your own printed projects, and hand printed yardage, you will want a copy of this book, too.
It's like a complete course on screen printing!
Printing has gotten a lot more user friendly since my mom was in business back in 1980. You don't have to construct your own screens anymore. You can purchase pre made frames and the fabric used to make the screens is a lot stronger too, making it possible to reuse your screens over and over again.
REVIEW
The book is laid out in seven parts:
Part one is an intro that will expain to you the basics of screen printing:
What to print, color basics, how to mix your inks, and the different surfaces with which you can make screen stencils.
Part two Teaches you how to set up your studio;
How to tape a screen, making a t shirt insert, building a print board or table and how to pin fabric down properly.
Part three explains how to make low tech prints:
How to make stencils from contact paper, freezer paper, acetate, drawing fluid, screen filler, paraffin wax and found objects. This is where I am going to start when I make my first screen.
Part four explains how to make more detailed screens:
Making screens that are light exposed like a photograph. These were the types of screens my mom used to make. Learning to expose chemicals and agents doesn't seem as complicated as I thought it would be.
Part five explains screen placement and pattern repeats.
You will need to know this if you want to make hand printed yardage in the future when you have got this screen printing thing down.
Part six goes beyond using only ink for screens;
handling dyes, using thickened dyes and bleach, immersion dying, and steam setting.
Part seven shares instructions for fourteen projects you can make;
It includes templates that you can use to make a bicycle tote, a ferris whell skirt, baby onesies, Ogee curtains an more.
GIVEAWAY
Sounds pretty interesting, doesn't it?
If you would like to enter the giveaway for the please
to accesss my full giveaway post and enter.
You will have to leave your comment after you press the link above because since I'm a Blog Her blog I have to do my giveaways on another page without Blog Her Ads. So if you make a comment below it won't be entered correctly in the Giveaway. Sorry!
