Fall always inspires a new intensity of color in my creative palette: Deeper colors in tones and shades of the colors I love to work with. 
Tones? Shades?…Tints? what’s the difference? …and where are they hiding in your stash? A good color wheel in your toolkit will teach basic color concepts, color schemes and show a variety of colors you can mix …including shades, tints & tones! My favorite color wheels are available on my website.The Artist Color Wheel includes info on color mixing for your paintbox too. It can be a good compass in your exploration of new colors combos as the season changes.
Studio Collaborations- Bring some creative friends into your studio to play this season! I feel lucky to have wonderful creative energy around me...including my son, Miles Frode! What a joy to have a window of time as adults to design together!!! He is a delightful and deeply creative spirit and teacher. He has added these new designs to Urban Cadence, his stencil line. We have been playing in the studio and here are ideas for printing these designs and folding them into your favorite projects.
Impromptu Circus (larger format: 11x16 ) Just the name of this one inspired this colorful printing on black linen! LOVE the shapes.
PRINTING TIP-To get colors to really pop on the black, linen fabric, print a light layer of white paint first, let it dry, then add another layer of the color paint on top=The colors are brighter! This technique can be used on other darker color fabrics.
As you can see, a strip of the design creates a front tab for a collection of favorite buttons. This is definitely a shirt project…maybe with some topstitching too
Miles has been up-cycling t-shirts using the Impromptu Stencil. The open shapes create a lot of movement and really lend themselves to various applications. On the canvas piece (on the left), he added some drawing with Fabric Pens then painted in the drawn shapes with Dye na Flow over a first layer of stenciling.
Stacked Faces- First in a series of layered stencils, this design has great angular shapes with lots of design potential. Each layer can be used in various positions to create borders. The all-over print above, uses just one layer of the image printed with black fabric paint.
PRINTING TIP-In this stacked printing, although it looks like a 3-color printing, it was created in 2. The first layer was printed in metallic purple. The second layer was printed with one color at each end letting them mix as they meet in the middle.
Your printed fabric can be the perfect canvas for a collage project. Hand-stitching is always a big yes! To take it farther, Here are some metal elements, including zippers, that might be added to this design. I cant help myself…this one will be a bag or a pocket!
This print above, on canvas, was a collaborative piece that Miles started and I layered onto next...we were exploring how the individual elements might be used separately in the design. We also played with combining solid colors with metallics (silver). Miles printed some of the Stacked Faces designs (insert above on black), on top of other previously printed pieces. ...everything can get recycled and step up the design!
Marta, an avid fabric designer and stitcher, took on the Stacked Faces stencil on some soft cotton knit. She printed each layer of the stencil on different pieces of fabric. After stacking the fabrics, she is stitching and cut through (alla reverse applique') to reveal the 2nd layer of shapes...can't wait to see this piece finished! 
Miles is printing on Watercolor paper then drawing back into his versions of the Impromptu Circus above. These, and more of his artwork are available on: https://www.facebook.com/wordzilla
See you in the studio! Diane