Monday, June 15, 2015

Trek Flag (and the Really Big Stamp)



Our stake is doing Trek this year (pioneer reenactment, complete with handcarts), and I was asked to help make a flag.  They had the logo ready, and wanted it blown up and transferred onto fabric.  I was pretty much given free rein in exactly how this was to be accomplished, so I decided to break out the craft foam and make a stamp.  I've done a lot of these but never one of quite this magnitude before.  It's about 18 inches high.

I traced the design onto craft foam and then spent a day cutting out all the pieces.  (Andy was a little too interested in the letters and kept putting them back in the negative cut-out.)  I got a big piece of clear plastic (Hobby Lobby has them in the stained glass section), and glued the pieces to that.  I wanted a clear background so I could place the stamp more accurately, and re-align if I needed to stamp the image more than once.



Today I cleared off the kitchen table and did the stamping.  It's on two pieces of fabric so they can be sewn together back-to-back for a double-sided flag. I applied acrylic paint to the stamp with a brayer, positioned it on the fabric, and hand-pressed it all over. 



On the second side, I mixed some Golden Open Medium with the paint, and it came out a lot darker.  So then I went back and printed the first side again.  (Good thing I had that clear background--I was able to line it up just fine.)

The verdict: it won't replace silk screening, but if you're going for that printed flour sack look, it works pretty well!

1 comment:

Heather T. said...

You made me giggle with the flour sack description, but I really love it! Came out quite awesomely, and your cutting skills are just exquisite!