The Construction of a Humble Tea Towel

We begin the construction of our tea towels by cutting yardage into towel size pieces and placing them on the printing table. Designs are chosen and printed on the base cloth with our custom made wood blocks and water-based inks. 

They are then hung in the studio to dry.....

This is one of my favorite parts of the process....I love seeing textiles hanging like this.....It reminds me of a place we visited in China where indigo textiles were draped over sticks throughout the whole village. 

Fun memories of our time in China......and part of my inspiration to learning textile design! 

We let the towels dry overnight and then professionally heat set them on a large heat press. This permanently sets the ink so the tea towel can be washed. The final step in the construction process is to turn and sew the edges and add the hang tape and the Made on 23rd tag! Please note those beautiful mitered corners! 

And then....the tea towels are folded, tagged, and shipped to their new homes!