When Seattle's Pride Foundation database manager came to us to talk about a minimalist, hand-drawn custom design on a soft gender neutral sweatshirt, we embarked on a fun project that took us down to Seattle's oldest neighborhood. Join us as we explore our process, from concept to design to printing to the final product.
THE DESIGN
Our client came to us looking for a minimalist design that would appeal to everyone in her organization.
She expressed interest in having a rainbow, but something that was just one color to retain its subtle, minimalist integrity. She was not sure if she wanted it to just say Pride or Pride Foundation, so we wanted to show her both options.
Our marketing manager initially consulted with her, suggesting going for a left chest print in white. She matched the client with our art director, who specialized in hand-drawn designs and lettering. We then created two options for the client - each easily editable, should the client prefer the imagery from one, but the lettering style of the other.
THE GARMENT
Our client knew she wanted something cozy, budget-friendly, approachable and gender neutral. We showed her a handful of our favorite crewnecks and tees in the most subtle and flattering tones. We ultimately settled on the JERZEES crewneck sweatshirt in oxford, which is a really nice grey. It's richer than your average athletic heather grey and it's universally good looking. A left chest print works especially well on a crewneck, as it can still really shine there even more so than on a hoodie. This piece is also gender neutral and available in sizes Small - 4XL.
PRODUCTION
Pride Foundation's database manager decided on the design that had the organization's full name in stacked text, along with the simpler, thinner rainbow design. That was also our preference between the two.
With the design finalized and garment selected - after receiving client approval on both - we headed to production - the process of placing the order and screen printing the apparel.
Screen printing is really an incredible thing to watch - our printers make it seem like a rapid, seamless, simple process, but one wrong move and garment loss can occur. They take a tremendous amount of pride in their work, so this Pride order came out perfectly. The entire process for this smaller order, from set-up to drying, took only 20 minutes.
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After burning screens of the desired design and mixing the ink in the requested colors, they get prepped - pulling the apparel, heading to the machine and spraying an adhesive down so that the garments can stay in place and not slip around during the printing process.
As you can see on the left in the photo below, once the white ink is applied to the screen, covering the portion of the screen containing the design, it's then pressed down to imprint it on the desired garment location.
Spinning it around allows them to work quickly - in this case, rapidly knocking out 4 shirts at a time. On larger orders, we go for an automatic press as opposed to a manual press, but manual is most effective on smaller runs.
After the crewnecks were printed, they came out of the dryer and were transferred to a table to be neatly stacked, folded and placed into one of our College Hill boxes.
Below, you can see them coming out of the dryer - neatly folded to maintain the integrity of the garment while allowing the printed location to quickly dry. The dryer is so hot that they dry instantly after coming through - they don't need to sit before being packed.
THE RESULTS
Above, you can see the crewnecks as they're packed into one of our boxes. Once they're packed, they generally go to the shipping department to send directly to the customer or, in some cases, get picked up by a courier for same-day delivery for an event. In this case, we were picking them up in person with the client so that she could experience the screen printing process in person before bringing them to her office to surprise her colleagues!
After the printing process was completed in Georgetown, Seattle's oldest neighborhood, we couldn't resist walking around the corner to one of our favorite local gems, the Georgetown Trailer Park Mail, tearing open the box and trying them on! These crews are so incredibly soft yet high quality and thick - somehow, they still up end feeling really lightweight. The print turned out flawlessly. We love this cute little design so much - it's an original, it's right on trend and it's in support of an organization doing amazing things in our community and around the Pacific Northwest!
Pride Foundation is a non-profit organization dedicated to creating safer spaces for LGBTQ+ folks and their families and networks in the Northwest. In addition to their Seattle office, they have branches across the area, including Oregon and Montana. Their mission supports the notion that every human being deserves to live safely and authentically in the cities and towns they consider to be home. It was an honor creating crewnecks to be gifted to the staff that supports these efforts.
Our client was quite literally jumping for joy after slipping into one of these crewnecks. Also, have you been to the Georgetown Trailer Park Mall? It is the coolest. It's open every weekend and they have independent artists and vendors selling delicious cakes/treats, plants, vintage finds, etc. If you're looking for something offbeat to do next time you're in Seattle on a weekend, we highly recommend it!
We hope you liked this little walk through the behind-the-scenes of our process! Want to see one on embroidery? Let us know! Just shoot us an email at info@chthreads.com.
Want to lean more about what we do? Check out some of our favorite trending apparel, our latest trending collegiate designs and our original business / organizational designs!
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