We’ve had so many customers ask us how we create our art scarves, so this week we thought we’d share the process and show you the story of one of our “Art to Scarf” designs, Seascape.
Seascape started off as one of my mixed media paintings onto gypsum, inspired by long walks along the fields and beaches of the Norfolk coast. The gypsum transforms the colours to a chalky palette of coastal tones with layered textures and mark-making that give a 3-dimensional effect.
We photograph the original art in our studio and work closely with our printer to transform the painting into a digital file. We thought that Seascape would work well because magnifying it to a large scale would create wonderful abstract detail and emphasise the natural textures of the gypsum. Joy had a clear vision of the design crops and specific shapes and sizes that would work well - from long silk skinnies to large squares. We were able to manipulate the digital artwork to achieve the exact balance of colour and texture before creating the final versions for proofing.
Traditional handloom weaving
We work closely with our weavers and printers in India. The fabrics we use are woven by extremely skilled craftspeople using traditional handlooms in rural areas. The scarves are printed using digital printing machines which are more eco-friendly than other traditional printing and dyeing methods. Inks used are GOTS certified, very little water is used and any wastewater is recycled.
We purposely use lighter weight natural fabrics for our art scarves because during printing, the dyes will penetrate through the weave. Whereas on heavier fabrics the reverse side will be considerably paler so doesn’t look as good when worn.
The hems on our silk scarves are either hand-rolled or we add a contrast silk chifon edging. Our cashmere scarves are fringed by hand.
Finally, once we receive all our art scarves we check them for quality and then wrap them in tissue and hand pack in our gift boxes. Wearable art scarves all ready to be sent to our lovely customers.