monday inspiration :: customer colour combos

I'm always pretty fascinated by what colours/fabrics my customers choose. After two markets in the last month where I have had a range of my "Fan" design available in quilting and medium weight fabrics, I thought I would share the colour combo's that were the most popular (insert impromptu little photoshoot with citrus here!).

Purple, red, orange and yellow : this particular combo was chosen by a customer at the Winter Design Market a few weeks ago and I just love it. I think these would look great as patchwork cushion covers {adding to my list of things to make}. Several other customers also bought this or a similar palate, but replaced the purple with ocean blue which also looks great.

"Oranges and lemons, the bells of St Clements" {totally stuck on my brain when I see these two colours} :: these colours have been the most popular of all. Perhaps it's the preparation for spring and summer, or just that they are happy colours. Who knows, but they work well together. Red {below} is always the go-to choice for people who see my fabrics, love them, "need" some and can't decide on a colour/don't have a specific project in mind. I think I should call it Stash Red!

Wishing you all a creative week, and hoping today is the day ...

Fabric and pennant available in the Yardage Design online store.

Happy Monday!

wrapping ...

I love wrapping gifts with fabric or a tea towel ~ it really is like giving two gifts. I wrapped this one up yesterday with my Fan handprinted fabric and a bit of measuring tape ribbon I had (which I love!).

Have you started your Christmas shopping yet? I'm about half way there, and hoping to finish next week before things start getting frantic! Stay tuned for an open studio announcement over the coming few days.

Have a great weekend!

printing :: for the swap

After more experimentation, yesterday, I finished printing my pieces of fabric for the handprinted fabric swap. I ended up moving away from the original blocks I was using, and going for something far more geometric ~ an old letter "z" ...

I printed all of the designs onto natural linen/cotton fabric so I could compare ...

I really like the Indian block I used, and managed to get the repeat reasonably accurate, but my ability to control the ink distribution well enough (in my view) just wasn't there, and I didn't feel happy for this to be my swap pattern.

 Similarly with the heart block ~ I like it, but don't love it ...

The "z" or "NZ" (as a few Kiwi's have pointed out on facebook!) really works for me. It was (enjoyably) very time consuming to print with, but I love the shape and geometry. I'm really happy with how it turned out. 

As many of you know, I love to wrap things!! These are my fabric pieces, all wrapped up using the fabric I printed with the initial blocks, some brown paper and jute twine. I hope my swap partners like them!

I'm already looking forward to the next swap. It's a nice to have a good reason to experiment with different techniques and designs.

A quick shop update ~ NEW dual coloured "Make your own bunting" craft panels now in stock here.

More creative spaces here.

wrapping ...

Happy Mother's Day to all the mum's! I hope your day is lovely. I'm lucky enough to be celebrating my third Mother's Day this year ~ we happened to be in the UK on the Mother's Day weekend a couple of months ago; it was Mother's Day in Spain last week; and, as an Australian I feel I should celebrate this one too ~ why not ~ get 'em while you can, I say!!

I've been wrapping gifts for some friends of mine (who are also mum's) using some of my fabric and some new circle stickers I designed and got printed via moo (they make nice adornments to plain gift cards).

Cheers!

plain basecloth fabrics now available!

Many of you have asked for plain basecoth fabrics to coordinate with handprinted Yardage Design fabrics, and I'm pleased to announce that we now stock some!

First up, the ever popular natural linen/cotton ...

Off-white organic cotton/hemp is also available ...

Both fabrics are medium weight (though the organic cotton/hemp fabric is slightly heavier than the linen), and perfect for dressmaking, soft furnishings, quilting and crafting ~ the possibilities are endless! These are the same fabrics we use to print our designs onto. Maybe you could try printing your own designs onto these lovely basecloths? We are selling these fabrics by the half metre as they are 140cm wide. There are more details about each fabric listed in their respective descriptions in the shop.

Have a great weekend!

P.S. Incase you don't get our newsletter, there is FREE WORLWIDE SHIPPING in the Yardage Design online shop for all orders over $35 between now and Mother's Day ~ just enter the word MUM at the checkout.

wordless wednesday ... wrapping with fabric

Taken with iPhone using Instagram

Taken with Pentax K-r digital SLR

Joining in here. Fabric here.

$10 fat quarters this weekend!

That's right ... $10 (half price) pre-cut fat quarters in the shop this weekend ~ pop in early to snap up a bargain! Get your own bit of Yardage Design handprinted fabric ~ each fat quarter is 50cm x 70cm. Make a quilt, a bag, a cushion ... I can't wait to see!

Happy sewing!

new fabric designs ... at last!

I am so pleased to be able to finally share my new fabric designs with you! There are two new designs, each printed in two different colourways, that collectively I'm calling Verano. Verano is a Spanish word meaning "summertime", which I thought was appropriate as I designed both patterns whilst I was here in Spain in July.

The first design is called Petals. It is a large scale print reflecting the ancient architecture and art nouveau that surrounds us in Spain. Petals is printed in ink blue and sea green on off-white linen/cotton fabric (140cm wide).

The second design is called Leaves. It's a pretty little curly leaf that I drew one day after a walk around the town. I really enjoyed devising the repeat for this design ~ it's a six spot repeat for those interested. Leaves is printed in crimson and powder blue on off-white linen/cotton fabric (140cm wide). It's really hard to capture the powder blue colourway with a photograph - it's very pale and delicate.

Each of these fabrics is available in the shop now by the fat quarter (multiple fat quarters are cut as a continuous piece), and incase you can't decide, there is also a Verano Fabric Pack which contains a 35cm x 35cm piece of each fabric.

I would also like to welcome my friend Pam to the Yardage Design team. Pam will be cutting, packing and posting orders for the Yardage Design online shop while I am here in Spain, so it's business as usual!

I can't wait to hear what you think of these new designs. I'm also looking forward to seeing what people make with them. I'm planning to make a summer quilt over the next couple of weeks.

Pop over to our creative spaces to see what everyone else has been up to this week.

almost ready

My new fabric designs are almost ready for release next week (just in time for Spring), but I thought you might like a teaser pic to tide you over ...

I really enjoyed photographing my new fabrics over the weekend. I can't wait to share more photo's with you over the coming days.

In other news, we're back in Spain (as of yesterday)! For a few months this time. Luckily, my lovely friend Pam is holding down the fort at Yardage Design HQ by looking after my shop and posting out orders for me. So it's business as usual - thank goodness for the internet! You'll also find me lingering around at strange times of the day and night (we're eight hours behind Australia) over on facebook and twitter.

Many more creative (and less jet-lagged) spaces over here!

cutting + folding

It was all about fabric cutting and folding here this morning, with orders for a number of lovely customers and stockists to fill. It's one of my favourite jobs! I took a few minutes to take some photo's ...

This set of fabrics will be at the lovely, crafty Onabee shop in Kensington tomorrow. I hope you are enjoying a sunny afternoon wherever you are!

fancy some fat quarters?

Stacks of pre-cut fabric fat quarters at 25% off in the Yardage Design SALE which starts tonight at 6pm. More details (incase you missed them) here.

Don't miss the bargain Misprints + Samples either - at $5 a pop, you can't go wrong. Who doesn't love a lucky dip?! Drop into the shop from 6pm tonight to bag a bargain (or maybe a very early Christmas present)!

cheats patchwork?

I have just finished my contribution to Vic's Cushion Swap 2011, and this is it ...

I make lots of cushions - for myself, for the business, for friends - so I used the swap as an excuse to challenge myself and try something new, using only Yardage Design fabric from my scrap basket. I came up with a "woven" design idea. Strips of fabric woven together then ironed onto fusible interfacing before being sewn in place.

I really enjoyed the construction phase and blabbed all over facebook about how I had discovered a cheats method of patchwork! Then I started sewing .... the first attempt was not so successful (too much movement and puckering), so I spent quite sometime unpicking before trying again with better, firmer fusible interfacing. Certainly not patchwork, and definitely not cheating! In the end, I was really happy with the result. I backed the cushion with navy Circa fabric to go with the ones on the front, and made the cushion reversible by adding an invisible zip. I hope my swap recipient likes it!

Check out other cushions being made for the swap over at Vic's - go here.

Have a great Thursday!

new stockist ... jellywares

Jodie from Jellywares in Cobar, NSW, is the latest stockist of Yardage Design fabric and bunting panels.

We actually lived in Cobar for a few years (about 10 years ago). I loved my time there, and still stay in touch with friends we made. I am so thrilled that the town now has a gorgeous shop like Jellywares selling wonderful handmade and home-grown products and produce. You can check out Jodie's excellent blog here.