# Printing on silk fabric?



## davejonez (Sep 4, 2009)

so I had someone recently contact me about wanting to print on silk fabric and I've checked other forum posts about this but I don't seem to be finding much helpful info regarding the issue. 

My question is this, what kind of ink would work good with this type of material, and what would curing the ink work like? 

Silk seems like a really fragile type of material that can be damaged easily and so i'm wondering whether I should take on the assignment at all?

any help out there?


----------



## demtangs (Nov 21, 2008)

I think silk would hold up. It is, after all, at the root of our profession. Silk-screeing. 
It is durable but maybe not the surface patina. I would thin the ink a little and use a light stroke.

Are they going to provide you with a tester?
I would take the job just out of curiosity with a full disclaimer that you are not responsible for any damages (I do that with all customer supplied shirts).
Then, try it out!


----------



## On the Rocks (Aug 2, 2011)

This is an interesting area.
My mother discovered I was interested in this and asked about silk.

She has what amounts a silk tee shirt.
The silk is a jersey knit and feels really soft to the skin.

I can imagine women really going for the feel of this fabric.

I had a scout around to see if there are silk "tee shirts" with printed designs.

I can find silk tee shirts, pure silk and a mix but they all appear to be in plain colours.
None have a printed pattern.

I went to my local Tesco (like Walmart) for a plain tee shirt to go on my introductory course for screen printing. There were men's and kids' tees but an absence of women's.

Is there a problem with screen printing silk? - no a woman was screen printing silk with plant dyes on youtube, so this is sort of happening.

Seems a bit strange. A silk fabric adds an element of class to a garment.
As I learn more of screen printing I will explore this.


----------



## artprintee (Nov 22, 2010)

davejonez said:


> so I had someone recently contact me about wanting to print on silk fabric and I've checked other forum posts about this but I don't seem to be finding much helpful info regarding the issue.
> 
> My question is this, what kind of ink would work good with this type of material, and what would curing the ink work like?
> 
> ...



Hi,

Reactive ink is much suitable for printing on silk fabric. Some use acid dyes to print on Silk fabrics. You need to do post treatment (processing) for fixation and no curing is required at all.
If you plan to print on silk fabric, you may digital textile printers in your town and they will be able to do for sure.


----------



## rudi (Mar 7, 2007)

We use to print silk all the time (repeat yardage printing) by the hand on 30m long tables.We printed for some of Australia's top fashion designers.
We use Permaset water based inks (not supercover), most of what we printed was one colour which is fine but when printing multicolour prints it can be a little tricky with the silk tending to shrink or move a little bit (you can also pre heat beforehand).
Screen wise we used nothing less that 77t mesh screens.
I recommend testing,testing and testing as silk can be expensive and of course more testing when i comes to heat setting your silk. water based inks take longer to fully cure than plastisol (i would also do wash test after fully cured).

Hope this helps.


----------



## ddante (Aug 2, 2011)

I agree with ARTPRINTEE, you need a good conveyer dryer too


----------



## On the Rocks (Aug 2, 2011)

I wonder how mixed silk/cotton fabric would behave.
I have only just started this game but as far as selling

"Exclusive design hand printed silk tee shirts" has an up market feel.

Get the right colour fabrics and designs they can take tees shirts to a "classier" level and up market means higher prices.

I see some totally awesome designs which are true works of art but they don't command the prices I think they should.


----------



## artprintee (Nov 22, 2010)

On the Rocks said:


> I wonder how mixed silk/cotton fabric would behave.
> I have only just started this game but as far as selling
> 
> "Exclusive design hand printed silk tee shirts" has an up market feel.
> ...


Silk is queen of all fabrics and awesome designs adds more glamor to it.
Best wishes, K.Ravi


----------



## aaronc (Apr 19, 2011)

bumping this for an update.

I was asked to do a project printing on silk, I actually work at a place where we hand print silk neckties so I'm very familiar. We use strictly water based inks there and iron heat set everything by hand. You're not supposed to run a silk - anything through the wash really so I don't think that's a consideration.

Now, I've been presented with a project in my own shop. I've been asked to silk screen print on silk boxers warm-up jackets. You know what they are, I'd assume they're typically embroidered but they wanted silk screen. 

Has anyone attempted plastisol? I tried it out and it seems like the fabric started to burn almost immediately under flash.

I also used versatex SOP white with much better results BUT unlike the ties I'm used to, I think these jackets will get a lot more wear and tear, and with the print being on the back I don't want it to rub off. 

Does anyone have any suggestions? I was actually thinking about trying some of the nazdar solvent based stuff that I usually use to print on metal. It air cures fully in about 8 hours and requires no further treatment. It would probably end up being a pretty stiff print but the silk is not going to crack and stretch like a typical cotton would. The specific cotton I'm working with does not stretch at all whatsoever.


----------



## adriatic (May 5, 2011)

davejonez said:


> so I had someone recently contact me about wanting to print on silk fabric and I've checked other forum posts about this but I don't seem to be finding much helpful info regarding the issue.
> 
> My question is this, what kind of ink would work good with this type of material, and what would curing the ink work like?
> 
> ...



couple of weeks we have had one enquiry from Australia for printing or transfer on real Silk. So what looked an easy task at a first place it happened to be real tuff one.

So I am just interested how you are doing it. Or if you have the same problem to solve here is our last result printed with Artist II inks. It is DTG print on that natural wet silk on an inexpensive Canon inkjet printer.. It is A4 size but can be easyl done on lager size.
What do you say?


----------



## pstees (May 27, 2010)

We had a customer bring in silk shirts about 10 years ago and, after the disclaimer was signed, did a test. It was just like printing on any other fabric - we had no problems and used plastisol inks. I can't remember if we had to do any adjustments for flash time and oven temp, but we have 350 silk/cashmere shawls to do tomorrow with a 2 color print + underbase. I'll let you know what happens!


----------



## multiplesifl (Jun 27, 2011)

What kind of hand does it leave? Does it weigh down the silk much?


----------

