The design process

The Design Process

Molly guides you through her design process, highlighting key skills and steps that can be applied to any print.

Equipment

• Ruler
• Potato
• Pencil
• A couple of sharp knives
• Sugar paper (or printer paper)
• Block printing paint (emulsion, poster or anything water-based)
• Stippler
• Tracing paper
• Mounted Linoleum Printing Block (Lino)
• Masking tape

Printing the Pattern

• You don't need a huge range of blocks to make patterns.
• Using sugar paper I print my star pattern
• A motif is the starting point of every pattern; it is the part that will be repeated.

Repeat Patterns

• A block repeat entails printing in a grid structure, with the motif repeated horizontally and vertically in the same manner.
• Printing halfway past the print above is referred to as a brick repeat.
• With a brick repeat, the first motif begins in the top left-hand corner and the one below halfway along.
• In a half drop repeat, every second line of the motif is dropped. A half drop repeat is very common on wallpaper.
• A diamond repeat is made by repeating the pattern in a diamond shape.
• An onion repeat, (or ogre) is where the repeat is shaped much like an onion with its rounded edges.
• A random repeat has no formula and the repeat is simply scattered around.
• A stripe repeat is where the repeated motifs are touching and the repeat is in a straight line, either horizontally or vertically.
• A half drop stripe repeat is similar to a stripe repeat in that the motifs are touching, but every second line of the motif is dropped.
• Top and bottom motifs line up in a connected repeat, with each motif connecting.

Further Reading

For further reading about block printing patterns and repeats, I recommends the following books:

• How to Make Repeat Patterns: A Guide for Designers, Architects and Artists by Paul Jackson
• House of Print by Molly Mahon

Your Assignment

Using the information garnered from this lesson, have a go at making some simple repeat patterns.