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For more than 20 years, Cotton Incorporated’s Fabric Development team has developed fabric collections called FABRICAST™, a quarterly release of inspirational cotton-rich fabrics that showcase new styling combinations of color, construction, and finishing. Now a new benchmark has been achieved… Home FABRICAST™ introduces a new group of seven printed fabrics. This is the first collection to be completely designed, digitally printed, and finished in-house at Cotton Incorporated’s world headquarters in Cary, North Carolina.
Each fabric in the Home FABRICAST™ Print Collection 2005 has been digitally printed with reactive dyes on a Mimaki TX1600S machine. The substrate fabrics used for each print in the collection include both readily available commodity fabrics purchased from a converter, as well as unique dobby weaves designed in-house and contracted for weaving specifically for a particular print concept. Digital printing is the best method for our needs at Cotton Incorporated because it allows for maximum creativity and is perfect for our short production runs of about fifty yards per style.
The prints available in this collection range in weight from 1.7 oz/yd2 to 10.3 oz/yd2, and color palettes range from just two colors to 50 colors. Motifs range from childlike to Asian-inspired. Finishes include Biancalani-tumbled for a washed, worn-in feel, as well as a glossy calendaring finish on a smooth satin weave. A total of seven fabrics make up this print collection, five of which are described in detail and pictured below.
 The childlike motifs of whimsical giraffes and monkeys can be seen in project 6394, printed in nine colors on 100% cotton unbleached duck. The pattern was inspired by an image seen on a vintage children’s handkerchief, and was modified, re-colored, and adapted for a half-drop repeat. A standard silicone finish was applied and the fabric was loaded wet into a Biancalani machine for aggressive tumble drying. The aggressive drying almost creates a brushed feeling on the surface of the fabric, as if it has been washed many times to make it extremely soft and drapable.
 Continuing with the theme of innocent motifs, project 6414 is a six-color print featuring silhouettes of winged fairies playing musical instruments. Figures sit in branches of blooming wisteria within oval frames arranged in a half-drop repeat. The imagery was inspired by a black and white illustration from an old European postcard. The fairy motif gives a vintage feeling, but in a modern color combination of pale yellow, green and pink. Curling pink ribbons and bows fill in the ground around the cameos. The pattern was printed on 100% cotton fabric designed in-house specifically for this print. The weave is a double-stitched eight-harness warp-faced satin with a 285 thread count and weighs 6.8 oz/yd2. After printing and washing, the fabric was finished with a cross-linking chemistry, hot calendered, and post-cured on a tenter frame to add a bit of durability to the glossy finish.
 Two prints, projects 6475 and 6476, show Asian-inspiration. Project 6475 illustrates a motif often seen in Japanese textiles, the chrysanthemum flower. In this two-color pattern, each petal is outlined in a linear, hand-drawn manner. This is printed on one side of a two-sided reversible fabric of 100% cotton. The drawn petals on the printed side of the substrate are a dark  brown that coordinates to the back side of the fabric, making it an excellent window fabric concept for tie-back curtain styles. Project 6476 is a 10-color print of flat, stylized flowers and fruit slices, floating on a solid ground. The scattered layout and slightly overlapping elements were designed to emulate the look of a Japanese kimono pattern.
Digital printing can be used to print as little as one color or as many as millions of colors for a more photographic look. Project 6392 shows different mushroom varieties on a solid ground, printed in 50 colors.  This print takes advantage of the unlimited color possibilities offered by digital printing, unlike screen-printing that would require a separate screen for each color. The 100% cotton print substrate used for project 6392 is a bird’s eye weave, purchased from ARJ Textiles.
Samples of all projects in the Home FABRICAST™ Print Collection 2005 are available for request by manufacturers, importers, and retailers of cotton. These, and all developments in the FABRICAST™ collection, were specifically designed to inspire the cotton textile industry. To request complimentary samples of these projects, or to inquire about other FABRICAST™ developments available for request, please contact Jill D. Gottschalk
Written by Jill D.Gottschalk
Interested in learning more about the printing process? Cotton Incorporated offers an educational CD-Rom entitled “The Art of Printing”, one of five available educational series CD-Roms developed by Cotton Incorporated to increase your knowledge and understanding of cotton textile processing. Other educational CD topics include weaving, knitting, dyeing & finishing and yarn manufacturing. For more information or to purchase, please visit the following link: http://www.cottoninc.com/TextileBasicsCD/product.asp?productID=6
 Printable Version
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