Thursday, October 04, 2018

TUTORIAL - Design Your Own Labels for Tea Towels to Print On Spoonflower

I have been designing fabric for my Kristin Nicholas Tea Towel Collection for the past 3 years. I sell them around the holidays and sometimes on-line. The first year I designed, sewed and sold them, it was an experiment. It went okay so last year I designed a few new fabrics. Those did well and I was able to offer the leftovers on-line. This year, I have been designing more fabrics and I am really excited about the new designs - more on them to come. 

I knew that I needed to put care instruction labels on the tea towels to be proper. Labels are also a good way to have an "identity." I started looking around on-line to see if there were any labels available cheaply with the proper fiber content and washing instructions. I couldn't find anything and really didn't want to order thousands of ugly little non-woven fabric labels. 

After wasting time looking around and checking with some label companies, I decided to design some myself and have them printed at Spoonflower - the place that prints the fabric for my Tea Towels. Once I made that decision, it didn't take me long to get the design together. I cut and folded some fabric to decide on sizing and then opened up Adobe Illustrator. (I could have also done this in Photoshop, but I am a little quicker with Illustrator.)  At the end of this post, I have a JPEG template you can use if you want to make a similar label to have printed for items you sew. 

I knew I wanted the label to have no raw edges. I wanted to slip the label into the hem quickly as I sew. 

Here are what the labels look like on the tea towels. 


Here is the backside showing care instructions and country of origin. 


Here is the fabric I had printed. The digital file I built was 6 labels up in 5 different colors - 2 labels in off-white, then yellow, chartreuse, turquoise and orange. Having different colors would make the labels easier to cut. I also added black cutting lines to make it even easier for me to cut the fabric. 


I purchased 1 yard of the basic cotton and my design yielded 192 labels. The per label cost was 7 cents per label (not including shipping - I ordered during one of their Free Shipping Promos). Next time I order, I may change the black box lines to something lighter but I am pretty happy with them. 

Here is my process for readying the labels to set into the Tea Towel seams. 

Step 1: Use a rotary cutter and cut a vertical strip of labels. 



Step 2: Using a steam iron, turn under each long side of the label strips by 1/4" and iron. No need to sew the seam down - a real timesaver. 


Step 3: Cut the labels apart. I use scissors because they are quicker on the small pieces. 


Step 4: Fold the pressed labels in half with the long sides touching, wrong sides together and seams inside. 


Here are my piles of labels sorted by color - ready to go into the Tea Towel seams. You can also see the backside with the care instructions and fiber content at the bottom of the photo. 



Here is a jpeg file which you can use as a guide for designing your own labels. This is my one color version. You can print them in as many colors as you want depending on how you design your digital file. Make sure your file is 150 ppi (pixels per inch) as that is what Spoonflower prints at. 


I have been sewing a batch of the Tea Towels and the labels work perfectly. I barely have to slow down as I slip the label under the hem and attach it onto the tea towel. I think they look pretty good. Maybe next time I will try a different one of the Spoonflower substrate fabrics but for now, I have 192 labels to make 192 Tea Towels complete with my own logo.  

14 comments:

Kerry said...

Kristin, I love the new labels! Where online will you be selling them? Thank you!

MelissaH said...

This looks wonderful. Would you consider sharing your template, if it's in a format that can be shared?

Kristin Nicholas said...

I don’t plan to sell them. This was just to help you make them yourself.

Kristin Nicholas said...

How would I do that Melissa?

Robin said...

Thanks for sharing this suggestion and your process! What a clever solution!!

Cynthia said...

What a stroke of BRILLIANCE !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Auntie Shan said...

They look GREAT! Love the colours!
But don't envy all the ironing and snipping! ;->
However, they do give the towels a tad more "polish" retail-wise. -- Not that your towels don't already look FAB!! But, there are still too many fussy "Brand"-inistas out there who won't touch ANYthing without a "Label"!! Hopefully, these will help SALES!!
:-D
*HUGS*

Jules Means said...

Oh Kristin, I love this post. I detest heat sealed crappy tags and always cut them out of everything (especially towels- sometimes they are so sharp they can cut your skin!). I used to order expensive tags from CASH, the nametape company in England our mum always bought them from, but I don't think they do it anymore. I made most of my kids' clothes, even bathing suits in the 80-90's. This is the answer to lovely tags that will stay nice and soft. You are a genius! Hurray for you and for Spoonflower! xxoo Jules in Beverly, MA

Jules Means said...

Oh, it's the next day and I found some of them from my old sewing days. STERLING name tapes!! But alas. They no longer make them with soft cotton. All vile polyester...
-Jules

Raman Raman said...

I like your blog very much..The new Omni thread is good so far. Love the colour selection...
I tried Magnifico last night in my embroidery machine and it was a wonderful thread to work with. No breaks at all!Thanks for sharing these valuable information.

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Lynn said...

Did you prewash the uncut labels?

Diane H said...

I'm knitting hats and mittens, etc., for our church Christmas Market and I think I'll order labels that say:

Hand knit, 100% wool.
Do not put in the washing machine.

thecrazysheeplady said...

Very nice!

RMK said...

Just caught up with this post. Stunning label & would work well for handweavers & scarf knitters, lol!

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