A peek behind the design curtain, or garden gate if will.
While trying to decide what the focus of the inaugural Kaleidoscope Studio collection would be, I went through a wide range of ideas…. Lions, tigers, and bears, oh my! Before returning to the tremendously original idea of flowers. Seriously though, I was pretty serious about tigers, so keep an eye out for them in a future collection. Flowers are one of my favorite sources of visual inspiration, friends I can always come back to for a wellspring of ideas and joy. So, I simply can’t think of a better place to start then with them. Monet put it best ‘I must have flowers, always and always’. So without further ado here was my creative process:
The design process for me starts with inspiration and reference photos. (This is after I pared it down at the end of the process since much of the original images seem to have no relation to the end result...)
While the next step can take many different directions for this collection, most of my earlier motifs were developed as stamps that I played around with before scanning and editing in Adobe. Even though my final print designs come together digitally it’s important to me have handmade parts of the process. I also find my creativity kicks in better when I'm playing with materials rather then looking a computer screen.
Layout Ideation: Some more ideation sketches, thinking through various layout ideas.
Digitization: Then comes a lot of time on the computer, creating a plethora of prints, so that I have a wide variety to narrow down to the best ones. Print design software has exponentially cut back the time it takes to develop repeat prints, but it is still a time consuming and detailed process. Narrowing down is probably my least favorite part because I grow attached to all of the prints – except a few which I keep around as bloopers.
I hope you enjoyed getting a look at my design process! Do you have a source of inspiration you always find yourself returning to? What do you think the next Kaleidoscope Studio collection should be inspired by? I always love to hear your thoughts.
Warmly, Nogah