Fiona Hogarth

My name is Fiona Hogarth. I am a printed textile designer/maker. This blog is mainly a place for me to share work in progress and the pieces I've made, along with some of my inspiration. I have a portfolio site at www.cargocollective.com/fionahogarth. I also have a Pintrest account at www.pinterest.com/fionahogarth for inspirations and an Etsy account at www.etsy.com/shop/FionaHogarth for jewellery and other pieces which I've made in my spare time.

[fionahogarth]

I started thinking about doing a mushroom related design quite a while ago and did some drawings back before Christmas but only recently managed to actually carve a lino block and get it printed on fabric.

It took me a while to work out how to structure it and get it to repeat but eventually I settled on this brick repeat, which as suggested by the name works like a brick wall. Usually I go for the vertical version which is called a half drop but I think this works better for this particular design. Colour wise I thought about using a brown but these mushrooms were more of a light brown/beige colour so I thought a mustard/ochre shade would be better. It's all come together in a way which felt pretty effortless, which makes a nice change for me.

I've already put these up on Etsy here with my other pieces. Now I've got some more fabric I'm planning on printing a couple of other designs on tea towels. I'm not sure exactly which ones yet but I'm thinking at least one will be a floral one for spring. Please let me know if you have any requests from other designs I've printed in the past.

[fionahogarth]

I found just enough of this old screen printed squash fabric to make a couple of coin purses in time for my first market of the year, which was last Sunday. As I didn't sell them (or anything else actually) they're up on Etsy now with my other pieces here.

I've also finally got a new lino block which I'm going to work on carving a new mushroom design, which has been on the backburner since before Christmas. I've got vague ideas for another digital design as well but that might take some more consideration while I work out what I actually want to do with it.

[fionahogarth]

I'm hopefully going to have a new print soon but I'm still working on restocking some pieces. This time I've printed some more rope print tea towels. I've printed them in green and yellow before but I think this blue is my favourite for the contrast and being in keeping with the nautical theme.

These are up on Etsy here with my other pieces. Please let me know if there's anything you've seen on my blog here that isn't there at the moment as I will be printing and making more pieces soon. I keep all of my lino blocks so they're easy to print again. Other prints are more challenging but I will see what I can do.

[fionahogarth]

I planned on taking a couple of weeks off after Christmas before I got back into sewing and designing but instead I ended up getting the same annoying cold/virus which worked its way around my whole family and it took me a bit longer to get back into it.

I've had the last week off my day job though so I finally managed to get back into sewing with these camellia print coin purses and pouches. They're up on Etsy already here with my other pieces. I do have a very long list of things to print and make after a couple of very successful markets in December, so hopefully I'll be able to get back into a routine and have it restocked soon. I can also print to order so let me know if you have any requests and I'll see what I can do.

[fionahogarth]

Slight post deja vu here as I made some of these tea towels at the end of October but I sold two of that batch so I thought I better make some more before my next markets. I'm planning on making some more festive napkins as I sold a couple but other than that my making's probably over for this year.

Hopefully I'll be able to spend more time finally working out my funghi based design in the new year as I'll be taking a break from markets until around March. I think it'll be a productive time, although I tend to have good intentions and then find I get distracted.

In the meantime these are up on Etsy with my other pieces here. I also decided to reduce my Christmas card packs to £7.50 for 5 cards as they really haven't been selling for the past couple of years and I'd rather focus on printing and making other pieces.

[fionahogarth]

After a while of putting it off I finally gave in and made some more of these holly print tea towels. I mostly want to focus on printing other designs (particularly the seaweed print tea towels I posted about recently as I sold two of them at my last market) and hopefully working on a mushroom print block but I have put these and my other festive print tea towels, napkins and cards back up on Etsy here. I may print some more of these tea towels if these ones sell, especially as I've got a break until my next markets in December.

[fionahogarth]

I got three of these seaweed print tea towels sewn today so they're already up on Etsy along with my other pieces here. This is one of my favourite print blocks to work with as it's so easy. The only difficulty tends to come with making it look random without being too chaotic or leaving too many gaps, which I am getting better at.

My next plan is to print some more festive tea towels as it's creeping closer to that time of year. I'll probably put them back on Etsy at the beginning of November, although I do have a market on that weekend so I may wait until after that.

[fionahogarth]

I've been wanting to do a mushroom related design for a while but I didn't have any references to work from, as I prefer to work from photos I've taken myself rather than looking for them online. There's a stump from an old eucalyptus tree in my garden that's been colonised by these funghi which appear in the autumn, so now I can make the most of that.

I drew these with ink and a bamboo pen, which I haven't tried in a while but I really enjoyed doing. Now I just need to work out which of these I'll transfer to lino to print as I haven't thought that far ahead.

[fionahogarth]

I didn't plan on making these pouches as I was going to make some with my sunflower print out of the offcuts of these napkins I made, but I found some of this old squash print fabric which I'd squirreled away and forgotten about and decided to work with that instead. I had enough to make two coin purses in each colour, plus a large and medium sized pouch.

I've already put all of these on Etsy for now with my other pieces here. I do have a couple of markets coming up in October so I'm hoping they'll sell well there.

I am going to try and start work on a new design idea soon, although I know that I'll need to print some more of my Christmas tea towels soon to be ahead of the markets I have lined up. Thankfully I do have plenty of cards and a few tea towels left from last year to work with as well so hopefully I'll end the year on a high in terms of sales.

[fionahogarth]

I haven't done any design work yet this week but I did get some wash labels that I had printed for my tea towels. I wasn't sure about getting them printed on a more typical satin fabric so I went for this cotton tape to match with hanging loops on the tea towels. Hopefully it isn't too difficult to read or too small but I am happy with how they look. They should give my tea towels a more professional finish and give some more information for customers.

[fionahogarth]

I've been back to printing sunflowers this week. This was another job I've been meaning to do for a while but kept slipping down the list of priorities. I've had people asking for a while about linen tea towels so I thought I'd give them a go to see how they sold. It's actually a linen blend fabric which is slightly less expensive than pure linen but still feels and looks great.

I chose this sunflower print because it's my most popular print by a long shot and I thought it would look good on the fabric, which is more of a beige than the cream cotton I usually use for tea towels. Prints can differ quite a bit depending on the fabric and it is more challenging to get a bold print on this one but some people do prefer the more subtle prints anyway.

These are already up on Etsy along with my other pieces here. At the moment I've priced them at £14 each as the fabric is more expensive but that might change in the future.

[fionahogarth]

I got three of these pine cone print tea towels sewn today and they're already up on Etsy along with my other pieces.

I'm sure I will be using this print on other items, I'm just not sure what exactly yet. I feel like it'll work well on linen or a similar fabric, possibly in a different colour for some variety. I've had some requests for linen tea towels so that'll be my next printing project, along with a couple of my other regular tea towel designs. Then I'll be hopefully working on some new design ideas.

[fionahogarth]

Somehow I worked out this repeat, put it on a block and printed it without posting about the design process. I actually tried out a couple of different repeats before I decided on this one, which is two different five spot repeats layered over each other. These spot repeats are a good way of creating a scattered pattern which has some structure and looks neat. It's also much easier to put this together first than trying to measure it on the fabric or do it by eye.

With the block I considered carving out the white space but decided it was better to go for the negative which I think works nicely and still retains most of the detail in those fine lines. I wasn't sure what colour to go with but I had this green already and it seemed fitting.

My first attempt at this print wasn't actually that successful as I attempted to line it up by eye from memory, which isn't that easy without practice. Once I'd worked out a guide for myself it was much simpler and this second attempt was much better.

For now I've just printed some fabric for tea towels but I'll consider other options in the future as I think the print is pretty effective, especially for a design which was fairly quick to work out and put together.

[ratatoskrr]

Made a reversible waistcoat for Castlefest this year!

I went for two botanical fabrics, the green one is a beautiful magnolia print by @fionahogarth that I've had for years but finally found the right project for, and the white one a nasturtium print from Borås my parents bought on holiday

The pattern is the Lilian gilet from La Maison Victor. I made some small adjustments, mainly for my narrow shoulders

[fionahogarth]

This is very cool and the two prints workly so nicely together. I've made a very basic waistcoat before but not a reversible one so that's very impressive to me.

Taking the opportunity to say as well that if anyone does buy one of my prints on fabric or wallpaper on Spoonflower then I would love to see how you use it, even if it's just in a message if you'd rather not post about it. Please tag me if you do post about it as well.

[ratatoskrr]

Thanks! Honestly making it reversible consisted of: not taking in the lining an extra few millimetres and sewing two buttons on back to back instead of just one! I was afraid it might be uncomfortable to wear with a few buttons on the inside, but they're small enough not to be noticeable!

Anyway I love this fabric and am now thinking of ways to incorporate the leftovers!

[fionahogarth]

It's still impressive to me. Please let me know what you come up with for the leftovers.

[ratatoskrr]

Made a reversible waistcoat for Castlefest this year!

I went for two botanical fabrics, the green one is a beautiful magnolia print by @fionahogarth that I've had for years but finally found the right project for, and the white one a nasturtium print from Borås my parents bought on holiday

The pattern is the Lilian gilet from La Maison Victor. I made some small adjustments, mainly for my narrow shoulders

[fionahogarth]

This is very cool and the two prints workly so nicely together. I've made a very basic waistcoat before but not a reversible one so that's very impressive to me.

Taking the opportunity to say as well that if anyone does buy one of my prints on fabric or wallpaper on Spoonflower then I would love to see how you use it, even if it's just in a message if you'd rather not post about it. Please tag me if you do post about it as well.

[fionahogarth]

I've got a more involved design idea I've been trying to work out in my head but I was in the mood to do something a bit simpler so today I've been doing some quick brush pen drawings of pinecones. Not sure what I'm doing with them yet, beyond using them in a lino print partly inspired by these old designs but hopefully a bit more varied and looser.

[fionahogarth]

I've been meaning to make some non-festive napkins for a while and I've finally found the time to do it. For now I've got six of these sunflower print napkins sewn but I'm thinking of making them to order in the future. If these sell well I might expand into other prints but this linen fabric is more expensive than the cotton I generally use for tea towels so I'll see how it goes.

These are up on Etsy already with my other pieces. I've priced them so they get cheaper if they're bought in bulk but I might change it in the future. I am probably going to print some more tea towels soon but I do want to start work on some new designs as well.