Fabric Paint at NINObrand

   During my time co-oping for NINObrand; a Philadelphia-based, modern women's clothing line by Bela Shehu, I had the opportunity to use my creativity in a much more literal way than I had thought I would when I first started working here. Bela had the idea to take a dress that had not been selling well, (due to the fact that it was the winter season and the dress was bubble gum pink) and spruce it up a bit with black fabric paint. She decided to give this to me as a project and I couldn't be more excited or nervous because this was a couple-hundred dollar dress to begin with and I was about to paint majority of it with black fabric paint...

I set myself up a station and realized that I really liked the environment of being "behind-the-scenes" with the Designer, Production Manager and Pattern Maker. It took about a week to fully complete this project as it consisted of painting in sections and waiting for it to dry, rinsing the dress and again waiting for it to dry. This process was followed by ironing the sections many times to allow the paint to really set into the fabric.  

I had a method to how I used the paint brush to create the pattern you can see on the dress. There was definitely some trial, error and accidental splatters, but I think that is what makes the finished garment so special! You can see the personality to it; nothing is perfect and it shows that maybe I got a little too excited while working on it :). 

This dress ended up being given to a high school student for her prom and I was able to talk to her and tell her how I really enjoyed working on it. I think it is important for designers or anyone who has their own brand to be personable and truly create a relationship with their customers to ensure long-lasting cliental. 

The Final Product!