We headed back into the print studio this week, this time Lisa was very keen for us to have a go at some Devore prints. This is where the substance that is printed onto the fabric takes away a layer of fabric meaning that where you print onto then becomes see-through. This works particularly well on piled fabrics like velvet for a more obvious finish, but other fabrics can work to give a more subtle effect.
This was something I had never done before and also something Lisa hadn’t done in a long time so it was nice to think that we were going into this together.
Unfortunately, quite a few aspects of our day didn’t quite go to plan with all of this. We had to clean some screens to get some new designs put onto them and when we tried to expose the designs they didn’t come out well at all with some parts of the pattern not appearing on the screen. We found out this was probably because the screens we were using either needed to be ‘ghosted’ (this is where they are washed even more thoroughly than with the power hose, using a very very abrasive spirit that completely cleans the screen so it is like new). This really slowed us down and put us straight back to square one. We managed to get there by the end of the day with a lot of hard work and determination (and hair dryers to speed up the drying process when washing and coating the screens). This was a good thing for me to experience all in all because it taught me that sometimes things don’t go right with printing and when they don’t you have to repeat ALLL of the previous steps – there are no short-cuts and you can’t be impatient if you hope to succeed.
The other days this week Lisa tasked me with creating a print for a gift bag that she could use with her upcoming show ‘the stitch & ink show’. This is a show that Lisa and Julinka are going to be doing together where they showcase their work here in London, as a bit of an alternative to premier vision (at the moment the general consensus between companies is that nobody is going to premier vision anymore due to price and covid complications etc). This was quite a big deal for me as everyone that attends the show would be getting a bag with my print on it! Knowing the client basis that both Julinka and Lisa have this was even more exciting.
The two companies were wanting to make a collaborative collection for the shoe that focused on Ukrainian Folk as a gesture of support for the current events in the Ukraine. I began finding some classic motifs and drawing them up together.