“We all have a role to play, whether we are suppliers, manufacturers, brands, associations, journalists, consumers or upstart companies looking to make dramatic changes. So the question for you, dear reader, is: What’s in your closet?” - Writes Cary Sherburne - WhatTheyThink

“Responsibly sourced and sustainable materials remain in short supply globally, and the textile industry cannot yet generate (or recycle) the volume required by the global supply chain across multiple market sectors. Whilst the fashion Industry is often in the spotlight, all textiles must become circular in the long term.” Debbie McKeegan - FESPA Textile Ambassador

In this guest blog post written by Phil McMullin of Epson UK explores the benefits and opportunities of the SureColor R5000 “Everybody is looking for something different. Something exclusive. Something that is added value. Customisation and personalisation with digitally printed wallpaper, that makes short print runs and print on demand economic and viable, can deliver this. The result is the creation of the perfect environment for market growth in both decorative wallpaper and functional advertising. I discussed the opportunities and growth markets more here”

“The A/W season also marks a return to “back to business” as usual, but with an accelerated appetite for new tech and sustainable solutions. With heightened market demand for flexible production, in challenging environmental and economic circumstances, nobody can pretend that the industry is thriving - its evolving.

All issues regarding sustainability have leaped into sharp focus – the spotlight is on the supply chain and how it utilises technology to deliver - environmental progress and efficient manufacturing solutions.”

The Designer brand exists in many forms across the apparel landscape (online and off) from couture garments to streetwear, sportswear and accessories. Print on Demand using digital ink jet technologies has unlocked the fashion sector to facilitate small scale personalised manufacturing. The availability of printed fabric, customised to meet your garment specifications – pattern, print and fabric type now enables independent fashion brands to flourish, online and off.”

Aquario Textile Designer plugin is an essential tool for the surface pattern community. The plugin allows the creative to design and prepare production-ready artwork in real time with absolute creative control. Wherever you reside in the supply chain, be that at origination or production, Aquario offers a valuable and affordable bundle of tools with which to improve creative function.

Specialist areas are a focus, and the business has grown to support a diverse portfolio: Retail, Signage, Events, Construction, Corporate Infrastructure, Fleet Livery, Luxury brands and the Advertising industry across a wide spread of market sectors and products. The business and the team have onboarded a deep knowledge of each of these sectors and the compliance and product specifications required. Whilst constantly keeping an eye on new technologies, materials and their potential applications.

In this video series, Debbie McKeegan, British textile designer and CEO of Texintel, meets with industry experts to explore the Epson SureColor SC-R5000 printer series to discover how this technology meets the industries demand for environmentally friendly printed production using water-based resin inks.

“We are Caspar Microfactory, a part of the Grafko-Caspar company established in 2001 by an expert in digital textile printing, Damir Hižak. Our company is in the small town of Varaždin, in the north of Croatia. Caspar operates as a separate brand that uses technology and digital innovation to provide every interested creative with the opportunity to personalize their own fabric and products. We strive to reduce textile waste during our production process and to produce our products as eco-friendly and ethically acceptable.” CASPAR - Digital Textile Printing

Following on from its immediate success last year, the GREEN GRADS story continues to build momentum as the team work diligently to deliver an evolving platform for innovative, sustainable product design. The platform is the brainchild of Barbara Chandler, a renown journalist and lifelong champion of the creative community. For many decades she has supported, encouraged and nurtured design talent. - Debbie McKeegan FESPA Textile Ambassador

“With energy costs rising at a rapid pace, simply staying in business whilst retaining established profit margins is a priority for many textile manufacturers and suppliers. It’s a tough time, and this cannot be sugar coated. In the front-line are the suppliers who must continually flex their supply chains to maintain product continuity, they must also continually evaluate raw materials and production costs to ensure that profits are maintained. The cost of components whether chemicals, dyes, fibres, materials or machine parts now fluctuates on a daily basis.” Debbie McKeegan - FESPA Textile Ambassador

“I’ve always wanted to combine different print techniques, so this was a perfect opportunity to start doing this. I think the printed fabrics produced by Epson last year where really beautiful and beyond my expectations, I loved the quality of the printed colours. I was very honoured to have won the dye-sublimation printer, the Epson Design Awards, and to be able to start exploring the possibilities with digital textile printing.” commented Sophie Wantia.

“Held annually and focused on bringing together the print community in one location to experience the latest printing technologies and applications, the Printing United Expo event provides a platform for all that is new and worthy of note. Showcasing applications and technologies for multiple markets, the show provides a unique opportunity in a physical format, where the industries application specialists are on-site for face-to-face knowledge transfer.”

The series features two design creatives, Katja founder of Elli-Popp a design practice that specialises in customised wallpaper design for the residential and hospitality markets who commented “Digital opens up my creative options giving me infinite scale”. And Charlotte, founder of Charlotte Jade an online lifestyle brand offering beautiful furnishing products including wallcoverings “Digital printing is essential to me because it allows me to capture every detail” Charlotte explained. Each discuss their businesses and how they utilise digital technologies within their design practice.

“A digital textile printing machine uses a printable design of a digital data file, reads the right color information, and prints the colors onto the digital printing materials.To fully understand why certain fabrics cannot be used for digital printing, it is essential to understand the technology behind digital print” Jos Notermans - SPG PRINTS

“The department is well staffed with experienced technicians on hand to help creatives explore new printing processes and discover new materials and applications. Creativity is encouraged and design boundaries pushed as the student’s experiment using multiple applications. They are developing two new print hubs which will be open to all creatives within the university: Fashion, Interiors, Textiles, Theatre, Graphics and Embroidery and knitting, Fine Art, nobody is refused access”.

““We've got seven machines and we're doing generally around about 120, 10m rolls of wallpaper per day on each one. We print six days a week, it’s around about 5000 rolls. We are the world's largest digital printer for wallcoverings. And we use more ink than anybody else in the world. But you’ve got to remember that wallcovering print is full coverage, that's where the ink volume comes through. We now operate using 7 HP Latex 1500 digital printing machines, running dual rolls.” John-Mark Founder - John Mark Ltd

“On-demand production continues to stimulate this sector of the marketplace, facilitating both creativity and commercial success. With no capital tied up in expensive design sampling and stock, the design community has finally been freed from mass production. Building a Textile furnishing business is now a viable business model, and for the talented, driven and business savvy designer, the rewards are creative freedom and entrepreneurial success.” Debbie McKeegan- FESPA Textile Ambassador

“Short production runs are now the order of the day, and even though economies of scale have been lost, forcing the production price up, yet the Industrial Printer balances that against warehouses full of unsold printed fabric that are cheap, but that nobody wants.

It is because of these reasons that Digital Textile printing has gained so much ground with its production value predicted to quadruple between 2019 and 2027.” Debbie McKeegan | FESPA Textile Ambassador