CUSTOM DECORATING
This is our specialty! Decorating team uniforms, team apparel, and “spirit wear” for fans.
We stay on top of the “latest and greatest” in designs and types of decorating. We’re just not dealing with cotton or cotton/polyester blends anymore. We’re dealing with different types of moisture wicking fabrics and with different types of mesh fabrics. And we have to make sure we know how to deal with and decorate each type of fabric.
Screen Printing
The “original” stand-by for adding team logos and names, numbers, and player names is silk screening or screen printing.
If you’ve ever done any type of stenciling, then you have a feel for how screen printing/silk screening is done. The design is burned onto a mesh screen, which is put into a frame. The garment is put on a form and the frame with the mesh screen is put on top of it. Rather than using a sponge, a roller or squeegee is moved across the screen stencil, forcing or pumping ink past the threads of the woven mesh into the open areas of the stencil onto the piece of apparel.
Screen printing is very cost effective when only doing one run of a particular design. However, if you find you need to have one or 2 more “fill-ins” made at a later date, those additional pieces will be much more expensive to make. The screen printer will need to burn new screens and reset the frames, which costs just as much as it did to do the original run. That’s why the one or 2 more “fill ins” are more expensive.
Heat Press Transfers
High quality Heat Press Transfers are actually specially coated papers that have the designs printed on them using screen print inks. When the transfers are placed on the garment and heat is applied using a professional heat press, the heat, along with the pressure generated by the heat press, releases the screen print ink from the paper. The ink actually melts into the fabric.
While Heat Press Transfers are a little bit pricier than a single run of Screen Printing, if you believe you are going to need fill-ins, they are cheaper in the long run. We always purchase a few more transfers than we need….and can always press a few more garments…in a matter of minutes!
Heat Press Vinyl
One of the products we can be more creative with when decorating apparel is Heat Press Vinyl. We can take a design and cut it out of a sheet of polyurethane (pu) vinyl, “weed” out the parts of the sheet that aren’t in the design, then apply the design to a garment using a professional heat press. Using this method, we can create one-of-a-kind designs and garments. Heat Press Vinyl is now available in a variety of colors and patterns (from matte to gloss to metallic to neon, from checks to plaids to stripes to zebra), textures (from puffy to snakeskin to basketball), and effects (from glow in the dark to reflective).
Dye Sublimation
Dye Sublimation is the process of applying dye, or sublimation ink, to fabric or other items, using heat and pressure. Sublimation ink has the ability to convert from a solid to a gas without converting to a liquid (think dry ice). The only types of fabric sublimation ink will “dye” are man-made fabrics, such as polyester. Dye Sublimation is more expensive than any other decorating process. However, a dye sublimated garment will hold its color and design for years. And, dye sublimated jerseys, shorts and other garments are perfect for teams. Because everything….from the color of the garment, to the designs on the garment, to even the player numbers on the garment, are “dyed” into the fabric.
Embroidery
Embroidery is the process of sewing a design onto a garment. Rather than it being done by hand, however, professional embroiderers now use commercial embroidery machines that have multiple needles so a single needle doesn’t have to be threaded each time there is a color change. Embroidery is great for polos, dress shirts, jackets, hats, bags, and blankets.