I can look at the moon forever. I love the surface: how it’s been beaten up and scared over time … it’s a great pattern to duplicate as a print on fabric: all you need is something round to print with, a plain pillow case and some white textile color.

 

What you’ll need:

– a plain pillow case in a darker color (brown, black, blue, dark grey – all will do well as the night sky)

– fillings ( I always use left overs from my fabric waste basket, see this post: http://raori.blogspot.be/2013/06/storage-inspiration-in-my-studio.html

– White screen print color

– a plastic lid to print with (I used an 8 cm wide lid for a toilet cleaning flask!)

– thick paper or cardboard (to help avoid the color going through to the other side)

 

How to do it:

1. Start by ironing your fabric / pillow case.

2. Put the paper/ cardboard inside the case, lay down your project on a working surface and make sure the whole thing is lying flat.

3. Decide your pattern: diagonally, next to each other, in rows … you can use a fabric chalk or marker to guide you when printing if you don’t want to “eye it”.

4. Most of the time, textile print color comes in a small and handy bucket. If it doesn’t, pour some color out on a plate or in a small bowl and start printing by dipping your plastic lid in the color, try to get the color surface as un-even as possible – lumps and thicker areas will form “the craters” of the moon. Alternatively, you can put something un-even inside, like that when you print, the color will not print the entire area and leave some parts of your moons un-printed. Just make sure the fabric is without pleats- the moon is certainly not striped, which will happen if your fabric is folded.

5. Put your project away to let it dry for a while, 4-5 hours should do it.

6. Fabric color is washable unless ironed, so make your color permanent by ironing it all over as hot as possible. Avoid steam.

7. Once dried and ironed, start filling the pillow with all your old socks (washed) and cut to pieces, your fabric left overs, your old threads, your overlocked cut-aways etc. Or you can just buy fillings (the one that looks like synthetic cotton) in any fabric store.

 

To make your own pillow case, please follow this simple guide.