Textile Design Practical and Project Work
This domain tests how you take a design brief from research to a finished, costed, documented sample. Assessment rewards evidence of process, not just a pretty final sheet.
The project sequence
- Brief analysis: end use, customer, fabric, technique, price band.
- Research and mood board with sourced images and colour palette.
- Design development: motif sheet, stylisation, repeat construction, colourways.
- Technical pack: flat sketch, specification sheet, construction and trims, seam allowance.
- Sampling and prototype, with labelled swatches.
- Costing and presentation in a portfolio.
File and production rules
- Screen printing artwork must be at final print size and high resolution (300 dpi at 1:1); a small file scaled up loses edges.
- For rotary printing the repeat must divide the screen circumference exactly.
- Every sample must carry a label: fabric, colourway, repeat size, date.
- Seam allowance goes on the pattern, not on the design sheet.
Worked example
A rotary screen has a 640 mm circumference and the design is a 32 cm half-drop repeat. How many repeats fit around the screen, and how many screens for a 4-colour design printed in 3 colourways? 640 mm / 320 mm = 2 repeats per circumference - it divides exactly, so it is printable. Screens: 4 colours = 4 screens. Colourways change the paste, not the screen count, so 3 colourways still need 4 screens, but 3 separate print runs. Reasoning: separate the tooling question (screens) from the production question (runs).
Traps that cost marks
- Presenting a motif sheet as a repeat.
- Artwork at low resolution or at the wrong scale.
- A repeat that does not divide the screen circumference.
- Unlabelled samples with no fabric or colourway reference.
- Omitting seam allowance or trims from the technical pack.