These bags of pure yumminess had to go on my souvenir sweater as they were such a joy during our trip ;). So after printing the sequoia on my sleeve I choose the tostilocos to cover the actual stain on my sweater.

I thought it would be fun to show you my process because there are some fun techniques in this print that can spice up your screen printing game. So let’s go! First up:

Cutting stencils for multiple layers.

I made a sketch in my notebook and then designed another one on see through paper to exactly fit the stain on my sweater, for perfect coverage. Then I cut one stencil per color. Since my main goals with this print was to cover a big stain, I started printing the tacos that had to be placed over the stain. The tacos and the lemons are both in gold (see how I decided on this color scheme using this extremely handy color book here).

With this first ‘taco’ stencil I did two tricks that I love.

Numero uno:
Adding texture to a print.
I cut some really small pieces of stencil paper and randomly placed them in the taco cut-outs to give some extra structure to the print. Same with the cut-outs in the lemon to make the structure of the parts. Easy to do and gives it so much more depth!

Numero dos:
Easy stencil placement.
Whenever a placement of a layer is super specific I like to first tape the stencil to my screen then take it off including the tape and place it sticky side up on the canvas I am printing on. This way I can hassle free place the stencil with the cut-outs, when I have everything in position I just place the screen on top and print away! (more about this amazing trick and many more in our book btw!)

Reparing a print.
After printing the second layer I realized I forgot to cut out one taco! Oh noooo! Can you see where? Just a little piece of taco peeking out the bag on the left.

Since it was just a small piece i just taped off the triangle and printed over it with the screen without a stencil. Easy does it!

Then I printed the Cilantro and Tomato layer and my Tostilocos are ready to go!

Up to the next print! I want to fill that sweater with aaaaaallll the memories, endless waves, beets (we went to a really cool beet festival, yes the vegetable), trumpets and horns and drums, cool Guatemalan busses, fire works, margaritas, the quetzal, guitar case, mexican flags, masks, awesome tents we slept in, popotes, Mexican dresses, vaping volcanos, the works! Which one should I print next????

Xoxoxox

Barbara aka Bobbinhood

We are Barbara and Dani aka Bobbinhood making our clothes last one print at the time (f*ck fast fashion, we are on a mission to make the fastest fashion, slooooow fashion, woehahahaha). We love sharing our screen prints adventures, surfing, traveling and making things and looooove to inspire so if you have any questions let us knoooow!

Wooooooooohoooooooo! The guide is now also available in an ebook version!
For those of you who missed out on the hardcopy, the ebook version is here. Or get the full experience (e-book, e-course aaaand e-guide) in a bundle. And because you are all so awesome and supportive we have a 10% discount, only valid this week (until july 19), use the code awesome. You can use it for any download in our shop!

Here is what to expect of our The Ultimate Easy Screenprinting Guide:

This guide is more focussend on tools and materials and not so much on technique (as the e-book and e-course are). We tell you how to make your own screens or how to source them, same with squeegees, inks, etc. It just completes the family ;). We start the guide with a little introduction on how it all started and explain all about classic screen printing and the awesome easy screen printing method. Then we talk about the art of up-cycling and give you a couple of fun easy ways to do so with your old garments. After that there is a whole 56 pages about all the tools and materials we use. We explain all about different screens, how to source them locally and also different ways (from easy to super pro) to make them yourself. We talk inks, squeegees, stencil papers and all kinds of other cool tools we love. Then there is a chapter on how to cut your stencils, how to print and one about the least fun but very important part of printing: cleaning. We finish the guide with some tips and tricks we learned along our 10 year Bobbinhood journey and templates of our 5 favorite prints (love! popcorn! surf’s up! ballet girl! doodles!). Here is the content page so you can get an idea:

The guide is filled with tips&tricks and everything is made super clear with fun and colorful drawings. All in all 56 colorful pages filled with all our screen print secrets!

Together with our e-book and e-course you should be totally set for you screen print journey.

Doing a last check after our boardmeeting <3.

XO!

Barbara and Dani aka Bobbinhood

Anyways, Mango here doesn’t care about our amazing, awesome 56 page guide full with all our easy screen print secrets (tools and material wise), but we still think it is a freakin’ awesome guide. And we are extra excited because it is an actual, real paper one and actually written en designed by us (no AI involved, it was real human labor, hence why it took so long and why it is so gooood!). We are only placing one print order so this is your last chance to claim one!

See the full ‘flipping through the mag’ clip below and order your Ultimate Easy Screen Printing Guide here. Orders close tomorrow!

Here is whats in the guide:

We start the guide with a little introduction on how it all started and explain all about classic screen printing and the awesome easy screen printing method. Then we talk about the art of up-cycling and give you a couple of fun easy ways to do so with your old garments. After that there is a whole 56 pages about all the tools and materials we use. We explain all about different screens, how to source them locally and also different ways (from easy to super pro) to make them yourself. We talk inks, squeegees, stencil papers and all kinds of other cool tools we love. Then there is a chapter on how to cut your stencils, how to print and one about the least fun but very important part of printing: cleaning. We finish the guide with some tips and tricks we learned along our 10 year Bobbinhood journey and templates of our 5 favorite prints (love! popcorn! surf’s up! ballet girl! doodles!). The guide is filled with tips&tricks and everything is made super clear with fun and colorful drawings. All in all 56 colorful pages filled with all our screen print secrets!

Together with our e-book and e-course you should be totally set for you screen print journey.

Oh look at that cover, we are in love!

XO! Barbara and Dani aka Bobbinhood!

We made and sold all those materials for years in our webshop and now that the webshop is closed (different eras ask for different business models, right?) we made a guide where we tell you all about that holy screen print combination. We spill our secrets about mesh counts, rubber stiffness, stencil papers and everything else you need to know to screen print without those scary chemicals at home.

And since we looooove paper goods we made it into an actual paper (magazine style) version. Only available through pre-order until Monday the 8th of June since we will doing one print run.

We just got our first dummy to check before the official version goes to the printer. We are so happy how it turned out. here is a quick flip-through! (And here you can read more about whats in our Guide!)

With the code earlybird you’ll get 20% off the guide to celebrate your awesomeness for ordering our paper guide, fully illustrated and written by us, real people in advance. We’ll make sure it is worth the wait!

XO!

Barbara and Dani aka Bobbinhood

In this time of AI scaring the hell out of us creatives, we chose to bring a real guide. As in a paper guide. Once you can hold in your hand and flip through. But we can only print it onc, so we decided to do a pre-order and one time only. So it’s a pre-order limited edition paper guide, hell yeah! And for all you early birds we have a discount code for the pre-order at the end of this email, yay!p

Read more about what’s in the guide here.

The pre-order is only this week from Friday the 29th of may until Sunday June the 7th. Shipping starts from the 22nd of June. We will only print one batch of the paper version of The Ultimate Easy Screen Printing Guide.

As we are opening the webshop for this week there will also be a small batch of Bobbinhoods stencil paper available on the website for this period only.

With the code earlybird you’ll get 20% off the guide to celebrate your awesomeness for ordering our paper guide, fully illustrated and written by us, real people in advance. We’ll make sure it is worth the wait!

PRE-ORDER YOUR GUIDE HERE!

One of the most frequently asked questions here and on our instagram is what the difference is with our (e)book and e-course. This guide is more focussend on tools and materials and not so much on technique (as the e-book and e-course are). Now that we don’t have a webshop anymore, we tell you how to make your own screens or how to source them, same with squeegees, inks, etc. It just completes the family ;).

Let us know if you have amy other questions.

And thank you so much for joining us on our adventure!

xo

Barbara & Dani aka Bobbinhood.

We choose to make our guide a hardcopy. Yessssssss, we both have been experiencing a big pull offline and although e-books are very practical we LOVE real books and mags. So that’s what we’ll do. Tbh we are a little bit nervous about it because it is a BIG investment and definitely not the easiest thing to do so the only way we can actually do this is with a limited edition pre-order. More about that later, I bet y’all want to know what will be in the guide. Well let me elaborate on that my dear easy screen printing fans!

We start the guide with a little introduction on how it all started and explain all about classic screen printing and the awesome easy screen printing method. Then we talk about the art of up-cycling and give you a couple of fun easy ways to do so with your old garments. After that there is a whole 56 pages about all the tools and materials we use. We explain all about different screens, how to source them locally and also different ways (from easy to super pro) to make them yourself. We talk inks, squeegees, stencil papers and all kinds of other cool tools we love. Then there is a chapter on how to cut your stencils, how to print and one about the least fun but very important part of printing: cleaning. We finish the guide with some tips and tricks we learned along our 10 year Bobbinhood journey and templates of our 5 favorite prints (love! popcorn! surf’s up! ballet girl! doodles!). Here is the content page so you can get an idea:

The guide is filled with tips&tricks and everything is made super clear with fun and colorful drawings. All in all 56 colorful pages filled with all our screen print secrets!

Pre-orders will start 29th of may (10 am CEST) until the 7th of June. We will start shipping the guide end of June. And because it is a pre-order I heard a rumor that there might be a discount, so check our next newsletter!

Together with our e-book and e-course you should be totally set for you screen print journey.

Oh look at that cover, we are in love!

XO!

Barbara and Dani aka Bobbinhood

I lived a year in California as a 4 year old and I even (accidentally) found the exact tree of one of my favorite pictures of my childhood. It is this huge fallen tree, my brothers are climbing in its roots and I am in my fathers arms. The fallen tree is still there, 40 years later, no root climbing allowed anymore but my heart started to sing when I realized it was that very same tree.

So as you can understand, I needed a sequoia on my souvenir sweater and y’all voted for it as well! I figured I needed this print on my sleeve and as I always want to try out different techniques, I wanted to see if I could make a big print with a small screen. Gotta have a challenge!

I started drawing the sequoia directly on two stencil papers I taped together. And made it into a 2 color print. The outline in dark blue and the leaves in mint. Love this color combo with the base color of the sweater (I used my amazing A Dictionary of Color Combinations by Sanso Wada book). I cut the stencils by hand.

Let me take you through the full process in 19 steps:

1. Made my design directly on the stencil paper, two taped together.

2. Traced the second layer - the leaves - on another stencil paper.

3. Cut both stencils.

4. Made a bounce layer I could slide into the sleeve.

Ok. So far, pretty much the steps I always do. But this time I also wanted to try something new though. I wanted to see if I could print a big print with a tiny screen. Why you might ask. Well for fun, and the challenge aaaand I like to travel ánd I like to screen print so if I can do this it would mean I can bring a tiny screen and print everything I want! Worth the try!

5. Instead of taping the first (trunk and branches - dark blue) stencil to my screen I now taped the stencil to the table so it wouldn’t move.

6. Applied the ink and printed the first part.

7. Moved the screen and printed the second part, this is where it slightly went ‘wrong’. Part of the stencil was still stuck to my screen and I didn’t see that so I printed on and made a cool shadow shape by accident!

8. Cursed a bit, realized it kinda looked cool, moved the screen up and printed the last part.

9. Cleaned my screen right away (obv, because noooobody wants a clogged screen).

10. Took away the stencil carefully.

11. Reassured myself it really did look cool and did a Bob Ross impersonation saying out loud: happy little accidents! to myself.

12. Cleaned the stencil.

13. Made myself a cup of coffee, enjoyed that in the sun. (You have to take time for the first layer to dry you know, could have used a hairdryer to speed it up but didn’t.)

14. Placed the second stencil (leaves - mint green) in position and taped the stencil to the table.

15. Printed the mint green leaves moving my screen once.

16. The last print was a little vague so placed the screen again and printed again.

17. Cleaned the screen.

18. Took away the stencil to clean and cheered out loud! Loooved how it turned out on the sleeve!

19. Realized I was late for an appointment about our guide and pretty much ran out of the door feeling very happy (and in a hurry obv).

    So I learned that you can print a big print with a tiny screen, which is very cool if you ask me! Also that if you do it the way I did it, you do need to put more pressure on your squeegee to make sure the ink goes through the screen.

    So can’t wait to make my next print for my souvenir sweater! Let me know if there is any specific technique you want me to show you.

    Xo Bobbinhood

    aka Barbara and Dani

    ps: The ultimate easy screen print guide where we tell you how and where to get all your supplies (since we closed our webshop) and way more is coming out sooooon! We are beyond excited as we are making an actual hardcopy in pre-order!!!

I like to draw and doodle when we travel. Here is a page from my notebook. I doodle mostly with my fave black muji pen, just quick sketches of things I want to remember.

(left a “ I am going on a trip an I am taking…’ sketch. We played that game for hours while cruising in our rented campervan through California. At the end I made a little drawing of it (not during the game of course that would be cheating!!! Right is a drawing of all the things miss J carries with her all the time in her bg <3))

So I will use all these doodles to create my souvenir sweater but first I had to decide on colors!!!! And I am so happy y’all helped me out. The poll of last week was pretty close but the most votes went to this one. I am all for this color combo and also using the freedom of being an artist to add dark blue. I think that will be a great color for some fine line details!

(read all about this amaaazing A Dictionary of Color Combinations by Sanso Wada in last weeks newsletter.)

I am really diggin’ those polls, super fun to see your votes! So I am thinking of making it a thing. This week you can choose between two very important memories of our trip: the sequoia and the tostidos (iykyk). I will print them both on my souvenir sweater but which one first?

Left: My favorite Sequoia tree. They are the tallest and one of the oldest trees in the world. 100 meters (300 ft) high and over 2000 years old. We camped under them in our little van and they are so so so beautiful. To think of all the ages they lived through! I want the Sequoia tree printed on the full sleeve of the sweater, nice and tall. I am thinking of experimenting with making a stencil bigger than my screen and see if i could print along, if that works it would be a game changer! Also printing fine lines is always such a fun thing to do. This one is time wise a smaller project.

Right: Tostilicos! My kids favorite snack during our travels in Mexico (iykyk). Not an easy print (read: difficult print) but very fun because of all the techniques in it. Lots of layers and some next level cutting!

So what to do? Ease in to it and discuss some basic techniques in my next post or dive into it and start talking advanced techniques right away?

Also let me know in the comments if there is any specific technique you want me to show y’all!

Can’t wait to see your votes and start printing again!

Xoxoxoxoxoxo

Barbara aka Bobbinhood

(Okay, okay, I can hear you thinking jeeeeeeez is thát your fave sweater? I know it ain’t fancy but it has the perfect fit and is 1000% cotton which I love (polyester mix sweaters make me deeply sad). Also it is soooo comfy and it has the perfect after surf feel and I bought it years ago in one of my fave surftowns, so…… enough reasons right there!)

What to screen print I asked myself and the answer came quickly. I am going to make this into a delicious long project of making a very fun souvenir sweater of our big half year of travel (wrote about that here). I love making souvenir garments after our travels like I did after our trip to Marocco , when I transformed an old tee into a lasting souvenir. That way I am not only up-cycling an item but also reliving your trip. Every time I wear that tee it also makes my housemates happy and I hear them sighing oooooh Maroccooooo.

I was looking around a bit in my saved instagram posts to get my inspiration flowing. I like to print out my inspiration to keep me company while I am doodling around. For me it is really important to have them off screen otherwise I get distracted way to much and forget to do what I really love… drawing and making real things (i/o doooom scrollling). Here is my inspiration for this project.

ulrikeleamoormann mlgrsdesign philippacoules fenmytaxena baema.t.boa

I was thinking of a color palette of 4 colors, one of them is set, the purple of the sweater. For projects like this I love to grab my A Dictionary of Color Combinations by Sanso Wada. This book always helps me to choose colors. It is a gem! There are two volumes, for this project I used the first one. When you select a base color, the book gives you a couple of options to pair it with. I really love it.

In the back of the book are all the color swatches, there are many. So you pic the color you want as a base color and behind that you see numbers. Those numbers reference to different color combos in the book (combos of 2, 3 or 4 colors). And at the end of the book there are even pages with small swatches you can cut out! So effin cool! (also the book was made in the 1930’s!!!!).

I selected 3 options and now y’all can help me choose. What’s your fave?!

(Disclaimer ;) I cannot guarantee that I will actually use that color way. Artists gotta artist….)

Can’t wait to see what you’ll choose. Next week I’ll start doodling away!

XO Bobbinhood

aka Barbara & Dani

The last year has been pretty amazeballs. After closing down our webshop and screen print cafe I went on a half year travel with my big love, miss M and miss J. We traveled through North and Central America making art, music and surfing lots (oh and also homeschooling ofcourse ;)). Traveling with a sixteen and a ten year old was pure bliss: The effortless of the almost grown up combined with the wonder of of the 10 year old, big conversations and big snuggles all day. (And of course it wasn't all bliss but experiencing all the ups and downs together is so special).

Meanwhile here in the Netherlands Dani was on her very own awesome adventure of a total renovation of a fixer upper into their dream home. While surfing lots for the much needed selfcare! Dani designed and constructed everything herself. Learning along the way, step by step, dry walling, making and creating an electrical plan, she did it all making their family home. Of course I followed along from my travels but being able to see it irl last month was so cool. What a place she created!

MORE ABOUT THE GUIDE!

Anyways. Enough talk about travels and constructing, Bobbinhood is going back to business, yay! We have been working on our guide the last couple of month and we are muy/very excited! In the guide we will spill all our secrets on our easy screen printing method. How to make your own screens (or what to buy if you are not so much the ‘making screens type’), the art of upcycling, what ink to get, what tools you’ll need and so on, so you can source all your materials locally and keep on printing now that the Bobbinhood webshop is closed (4 everrr!). Lots of you have been asking all kinds of questions about easy screen printing and this guide will answer them all! Wohooo!

Now that we are getting close to launching a guide we have one small question and it would mean a lot if you could help us out with this. We would love to make a hardcopy guide. Since we love making things and when we make things we don’t need the distraction of being online. BUT having them printed is quite the investement sooooo we want to know, what would you prefer? Please vote, that would help us so much!

Also you might have noticed that we are substackers now! Tbh we have to explore the platform more. For now we are using it to send our newsletters but we have plans to create a cool print club here (long time dream!). We are hearing Substack has the same vibes early instagram had and I loooooooooved that era, so we are very much here for it! Let us know what you would love us to bring you here on substack. We can't wait to guide you on your screen printing journey!

If you have any questions please let us know! ❤️

Lot’s of love, Bobbinhood. XO Barbara and Dani.

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