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  • Handprinted Christmas Project: Shirley’s Star Garland

    Handprinted Christmas Project: Shirley’s Star Garland

    Shirley’s star garland is a beautiful and colourful addition to your home this Christmas! Begin with several sheets of stars – print Shirley’s star template A4 page here. This long garland used 8 sheets of stars. Use whatever paper that can go through your printer – Shirley is using Kent which is thin enough to … Continue reading "Handprinted Christmas Project: Shirley’s Star Garland"
  • Editioning Prints

    Editioning Prints

    One of the great things about printmaking is that one design can be used to create a whole edition of prints. That being said, editioning is something that some printmakers can find frustrating if you just want to get on with the next design! Knowing how to edition, sign and number your prints can be … Continue reading "Editioning Prints"
  • Repurposing Objects for your Printmaking Kit

    Repurposing Objects for your Printmaking Kit

    There are many objects that can be gathered from around the house to add to your printmaking kit! Here are some of our favourite alternative uses for easily found objects that we use in the studio every day!  Use clips on your hinged screen for an easy squeegee rest: Securing two large clips to your …
  • Making a Hinged Board for Screen Printing onto Paper

    Making a Hinged Board for Screen Printing onto Paper

    Using a hinged board to screen print onto paper is a game changer. It allows you to register layered prints and print in identical editions. Here’s how we made our latest batch of A2 hinged boards in the studio: You will need a board at least the same width and slightly longer than your screen...
  • How to Mix Pigment and Binder to Screen Print onto Fabric

    How to Mix Pigment and Binder to Screen Print onto Fabric

    Making your own inks for screen printing onto fabric is an economical way to get a wide range of colours exactly to your specifications. The mixed inks will leave the fabric soft and washable. Here’s how to mix them: Start with Fabric Screen Printing Binder. This is a colourless screen printing medium and will form the … Continue reading "How to Mix Pigment and Binder to Screen Print onto Fabric"
  • Making a Fabric Printing Pad

    Making a Fabric Printing Pad

    Having a fabric printing pad makes a huge difference when you’re printing at home or in the studio. When screen printing or block printing onto fabrics, it helps to have slight padding underneath your printing surface to ensure you get an even print. You can also pin out fabric to the pad. We use these …
  • Drawing Fluid and Filler Screen Printed Christmas Cards

    Drawing Fluid and Filler Screen Printed Christmas Cards

    This is a really fun way of making a big batch of Christmas cards. Making a screen with drawing fluid and filler maintains a hand-drawn look whilst giving a flat professional finish that’s the same on every card. Here’s how: Draw around a blank card onto a piece of paper. Draw your design in the …
  • Halloween Printing with Night Glo Acrylic Ink!

    Halloween Printing with Night Glo Acrylic Ink!

    If you’re a Halloween lover this project is for you! We’ve had a go with Speedball’s Acrylic Night Glo Ink and made our own glow in the dark Halloween poster. This ink really gives your prints a twist – it would be great for children’s (or adults’!) bedrooms too. This project uses paper stencils to …
  • Screen Printing Hand Drawings using Film Marker Pens

    Screen Printing Hand Drawings using Film Marker Pens

    Translating drawings into print doesn’t have to include scanning and digitally manipulating your design on a computer. By using opaque film markers onto screen film we are able to skip the digital part altogether and create a photographic screen directly from the drawings you produce. This allows you to work in full scale, even tracing…
  • Caring for an Exposed Screen

    Caring for an Exposed Screen

    It’s important to take care of your exposed screen so that it can last for multiple print runs. With proper care, you should be able to use your screen again and again until you’re ready to have it washed off and a new design exposed. Read on for a list of rules and advice …
  • Screen Printing Hand Drawn Designs with Grain Mark Screen Film

    Screen Printing Hand Drawn Designs with Grain Mark Screen Film

    We often talk about creating digital images to make exposed screens but there are a lot of ways to use hand drawn designs that bypass the need for computers at all – hooray! Grain Mark Screen Film allows you to draw directly onto a screen film whilst maintaining all your lovely textural marks. Charcoal and … Continue reading "Screen Printing Hand Drawn Designs with Grain Mark Screen Film"
  • What’s a Halftone? Screen Printing a Tonal Image

    What’s a Halftone? Screen Printing a Tonal Image

    People often want to screen print photographic images and hope to use black and white photographs for this. To do this you need an exposed screen. The way screen printing works is the mesh either has to be open or closed (ink passes through the open areas but cannot pass through the closed areas) therefore …
  • Screen Printing a Graphite Drawing

    Screen Printing a Graphite Drawing

    When we think of screen printed artwork we tend to see bold areas of bright colour and graphic lines but there are lots of different styles that can be achieved. By using graphite directly onto the mesh of a screen we can create loose, printed sketches that can be used for layering or as prints … Continue reading "Screen Printing a Graphite Drawing"
  • How Much Detail on Exposed Screens?

    How Much Detail on Exposed Screens?

    When designing artwork for exposed screens it can be very difficult to figure out what level of detail you can include. Different mesh counts will be able to handle different levels of detail. The mesh number relates to how many threads there are per cm of mesh: 32T has 32 threads per cm, 120T has …
  • Screen Printing onto Dark Fabrics with Yellow Ink

    Screen Printing onto Dark Fabrics with Yellow Ink

    In last week’s blog post we began looking at which inks were suitable for screen printing onto dark fabrics. We used three different screen printing inks and looked at the difference between standard and opaque inks when printing with white. All of the white inks printed well onto the black fabric – white inks are…
  • Screen Printing onto Dark Fabrics with White Ink

    Screen Printing onto Dark Fabrics with White Ink

    Screen printing onto fabric tends to get a little complicated as soon as you want to print onto dark coloured fabrics. Standard screen printing inks are translucent and will therefore show some of the base colour through when printed. When printing onto white or pale coloured fabrics this is not a problem. Most standard screen … Continue reading "Screen Printing onto Dark Fabrics with White Ink"
  • Using Red Masking Film to Expose A Screen

    Using Red Masking Film to Expose A Screen

    When it comes to screen printing there are so many ways to create your image. You can cut paper stencils, use Drawing Fluid and Filler, create exposed screens with hand drawn or computer drawn designs. Red Masking Film is a brilliant way of creating exposed screens. It’s transparent so can be used to trace over … Continue reading "Using Red Masking Film to Expose A Screen"
  • Which Inks Can I Use?

    Which Inks Can I Use?

    Knowing which inks to use for which printing project can be a minefield. There are different inks for screen printing, relief printing and intaglio. Some can be used for more than one technique, some are only suited to one. Some can be used for printing onto fabric, some only for paper. We’ve created a chart … Continue reading "Which Inks Can I Use?"
  • How to Screen Print with Paper Stencils

    How to Screen Print with Paper Stencils

    In this project we will show you how to screen print onto paper using paper stencils. With this method, you can print multiples of your designs in several layers of flat colour without having to make an exposed screen or using screen filler. When screen printing, ink is forced through a fine mesh onto a …
  • Getting a Drawn Design Ready for a Screen

    Getting a Drawn Design Ready for a Screen

    Screen printing is a brilliant way to make the most of your hand drawn designs. It enables you to print them multiple times for framed artwork or cards or to create your own fabrics, bags and t-shirts. You can use your designs to make into photographic screens yourself at home or we can make them … Continue reading "Getting a Drawn Design Ready for a Screen"