Custom Fabric Printing: A Step-by-Step Guide for Brands and Creatives

Today I would like to spotlight custom prints.

More and more, we are seeing two types of enquiries come through. Clients who already have a print motif and need us to turn it into a repeat and print it on fabric, and clients who have an idea in their head and want to know exactly what steps to follow to bring it to life. So this post walks you through our custom print process, step by step.

Say you are a brand looking to launch a new line for this season or the next, and you have an inkling of what you want. Here is what happens from the moment you contact us.

Step 1: We Look at Your Design File

The first thing we do is get on a call or exchange emails to discuss your print requirements.

You will normally have a design file. It could be high resolution or low resolution — we can work with either. Low resolution files can be enhanced. If your design is ready to go, that is great. We check that the file is layered and laid out to a certain size, depending on the fabric you would like to print on.

What we check at this stage is whether the file is layered, technically sound and sized appropriately for the fabric width you have in mind.

One thing that catches many clients off guard is repeatability. A lot of people assume that a motif they have designed is ready to become a seamless print pattern. Often it is not quite there yet, either technically or from a design perspective. This is where our design correction service comes in. At around USD 50, we will correct your artwork, whether that means a redraw or adjusting the motif to repeat cleanly. We take care of that for you.

Step 2: Getting the Colours Right

Colour is more important than most people expect, and here is why. What you see on your screen and what ends up on fabric can look quite different. You want the colour you get to match the colour you envisioned.

For printing, we work with CMYK and Pantone shades. We prefer Pantone because it gives us the most accurate spot colour match to what you want.

If you are a brand and you know exactly which colours you want on your print, say it is a three colour job, yellow, orange and brown, those three colours need to be confirmed as the ones you are going with when the print is done. We ask for your brand guidelines if you have them, or we go with what you prescribe.

In the instance where we are designing the pattern for you, we will work on the colours by offering you three colourway options, or we work around the colours you are interested in, and then you decide on the shades or hues you would like to go with.

At this point, everything is still digital. We have not printed a single thing yet.

Step 3: Preparing the Print-Ready File

This is perhaps the single most important step in the whole process.

Here we make sure the design is a seamless, repeatable print. That means when the motif is tiled across the artboard, it joins cleanly at every edge — left, right, top and bottom — with no visible breaks or seams. There are several ways a print can repeat: full drop, half drop, random toss, and many other variations. The principle is the same in each case. The motif must tile perfectly.

At UndaMeta, our standard print file is 150 cm wide by 100 cm long, because most of our fabrics start at 150 cm width. That said, it is not fixed. We work with fabrics up to 182 cm wide, and with narrower fabrics too, at approximately 47 inches. Our Trailblazer and Khanga fabrics (Taikenya and Tausi) are good examples of the narrower end. In every case, the artwork is prepared to match the specific fabric width the client has chosen.

Again, everything at this stage is still digital. The file has not gone to the printer yet.

Step 4: Client Approval

Nothing goes to print without your sign-off. Approval can be done via email (as a digital proof) or directly on the artwork file. You are confirming that you are happy with the colour, the seamlessness, the scale, all of it. This step protects you and it protects us. Both parties need to be fully aligned before anything moves forward.

Step 5: Over to the Printer

Once we have approval, we pass the high-resolution file to our printer. At this stage, our printers reassess the motif, make sure it is tiling properly, and check that the colours are in good order.

A case in point here is our lesos printed using the rotary method. When we are printing on lesos, we normally only run a three-colour job. So if there is an extra colour that needs to be adjusted or knocked out, this is something the printer flags and advises on at this stage. They use specific technology that positions the print file and gets it ready for printing on the actual fabric.

Our printers use very intelligent technology, both hardware and software, to get the file ready for the machine.

Step 6: Printing and Curing

The printing process is a digital one, which means it is quick and efficient. Depending on the fabric the client has approved, that specific fabric is loaded onto the printing machine (roll-to-roll) and the artwork is printed directly onto it.

After that, the printed fabric goes into a dryer and sits there for a while to cure. Curing is essentially the drying process and also the step that secures the dye into the fabric. Once that is done, the fabric is brought back to UndaMeta and it is ready for packaging and delivery to the client.

Those are the six steps we follow for custom fabric printing.

Why Brands Are Coming to Us Right Now

We are seeing strong interest in limited edition prints for apparel and product design, and in custom prints being used specifically to launch brands. If you are starting a new line and want a design that sets you apart from the start such as, a signature print, a house motif, an emblem that people will associate with your brand then custom fabric printing is one of the most powerful ways to establish that identity.

Reach out via our email, telephone, or the contact form on our website. We look forward to bringing your print to life.