What We Make - Umbrellas Custom

This Art Print Umbrella is an example of a two panel umbrella design with the panels repeating around the umbrella to create an overall effect. You can see in the detail to the right that the two panels are engineered so the artwork lines up at the seams. The image looks complete, even though it is actually two panels sewn together. Full-color printing is used here to create these vibrant color-fast results. When working with paintings or full color photographs we recommend full-color printing to capture these types of results. These panels are printed before the umbrella is assembled.

In this layout for another full color umbrella you can see that the artwork was repeated on all eight of the panels and creates an attractive decorative edge to the umbrella. We would call this one panel repeating. When we print our full color umbrellas we are starting with white fabric and printing all of the colors you see with four color process printing. In some cases, when there are especially strong accent colors in the design, we will add additional boost colors to the print so that the final umbrella will come out with the desired vibrancy in the print. This type of process printing is necessary when you have full color imagery or full color photographs on the umbrella.

Sometimes a great way to make an umbrella project have some variety is to change the color of the umbrella fabric. In this case, we have the same silkscreen design on two different color umbrellas and it makes a completely different looking umbrella. If you look closely at these umbrellas you will see that the panels while they look almost the same are actually slightly different. Every other panel has a logo on it. So, it makes the overall look feel more decorative than strictly a logo oriented umbrella. The other important thing to notice about this umbrella design is that the print goes all the way to the edge of the umbrella and into the seams. In order to create this kind of print placement we need to print on the umbrella panels before they are sewn into umbrellas. There is no way to get this kind of coverage if we are printing on a finished umbrella. Custom making an umbrella will take longer than just printing a logo on a finished umbrella, but as you can see the results make all the difference. If you want to see more of our color fabrics click here to view those options.

Sometimes you want a graphic to appear right in the center of your umbrella. In order to accomplish that effect on this umbrella we made eight different screens and printed all eight panels of our umbrella first, and then sewed them up so that the graphic would appear as a complete image. In this case, it is a graphic of a butterfly, but it could be a logo in the center of an umbrella just as easily. Again, our technique is to print on the panels before me manufacture the umbrella, so that we can achieve the effect of the print right in the center of the umbrella.

When we print fabric for our umbrellas we also have the option of making matching umbrella and bag sets. As you can see from the umbrella and bag set pictured here, we created the overall pattern so that when it was printed we could turn the design any direction and make bags or umbrellas. This set even had a matching cosmetic case to complete the set. The one thing you want to keep in mind when designing a textile repeat like this is that the design can be viewed from all directions and that it will not matter how the design is matched up it will still be attractive. The main reason for that type of care in the textile design is that you want to have maximum efficiency in the fabric usage and have as little waste as possible.

Another attractive aspect of printing yard goods for umbrellas is that the color penetration through the fabric is very rich as you can see here on the interior view of the umbrella. The colors used to print running yard goods saturate the fabrics more than other kinds of printing and in the case of dark colors, it may be important to consider fabric printing as a solution. We can evaluate that when we begin to discuss your umbrella project.

Interior print umbrellas allow you to have a fully printed image on the interior of your umbrella and a solid color for the exterior. Sometimes, you want a solid color exterior layer with a logo and the surprise of the image or a color on the interior of your umbrella. In this case, we created a matching tote bag to the image on the interior of this umbrella. If you look closely we had two different images on the umbrella repeating all the way around the interior layer of the umbrella which gives it a colorful flow and does not feel redundant. Since this interior print umbrella is not a pattern but a famous painting, we wanted to be sure it felt like a complete image. This set was created for the Detroit Institute of the Arts and features a Diego Rivera mural in their collection.

The tote bag handles were matched to the black hardware of the umbrella in this set to complete the overall effect, and the exterior layer of the umbrella was also in black fabric.