Technique

A design may be drawn on to Soft Cut with a pencil or pen. Your design may be a part of a repeat design or a one off motif. If working with a repeat design you can transfer one part of your design on to the Soft Cut carving block and each time you print the block, it should join up to create a repeat or pattern.

Soft Cut carving block may be carved with lino tools.  Both sides of the Soft Cut block may be used.

The Soft Cut carving block may be used to print on both paper and fabric, the Soft Cut also works well as a rubbing block.

When using the Soft Cut to print on to fabric a textile ink or paint is required.

Any of the following inks will give you good results – Texcraft Printing Inks, Permaset Printing Inks or Dual Purpose Fabric Paints. These are all heat set fabric paints which need to be iron fixed to make them permanent on fabric. All paints are suitable for natural fibres only.

The best way to get the textile ink on to the Soft Cut carving block is to use a foam roller. Place a small amount of fabric paint into a container and use the foam roller to coat the Soft Cut. Do a test print before printing on to the fabric – the Soft Cut carving block will need to be re-inked after every print. This will ensure an even finish and print on the fabric.    

 When you have finished with using the Soft Cut printing block it can be washed out and re-used for other applications.    

Materials

Soft Cut Carving Block – small 11 x 11 cm (also available in bulk packets of 10)

                                       - large   15 x 21 cm (also available in bulk packets of 10)

Foam rollers – 60 mm or 85 mm

Texcraft Printing Ink – 1 lt

Permaset Aqua Ink – 300 mL or 1 lt

(300 mL – Super Cover colours for printing on dark coloured fabrics)

Dual Purpose Fabric Paints- 250 mL or 1 lt

**Note – these inks will print on to natural fibres and light to medium coloured fabrics – not suitable for printing on black or dark fabric.