Textile printing can often be considered part of the finishing industry.

Fabric printing is an art form and can be done in many different ways. It is essentially a decorative pattern or design that is applied to constructed fabric.

Textile printing is an ancient art form found on cloth in Egyptian tombs dating to about 5000B.C. Greek fabrics dating from the 4th century B.C. have also been found. Block prints were first seen imported from India to the Mediterranean in 5th C B.C.
During the renaissance, Indian chintz was imported to Europe, where it became popular and was imitated. France became a leading centre of this type of cloth production during that time. Stencil work, a highly developed form of printing from Japan was another early discovery of applying pattern to fabric.

Roller Printing Flat (Silk) Screen Printing Rotary Screen Printing Block Printing Heat Transfer Printing Dye Sublimation Printing Resist Printing

This process involves a print paste (like a thick paint) that is applied to an engraved roller, and the fabric is guided between it and a central cylinder. The pressure of the roller and central cylinder forces the print paste into the fabric. Because of the high quality it can achieve, roller printing is the most appealing method of printing designer and fashion apparel fabrics.

Long runs of the same fabric design are produced on a roller print cylinder machine operating at speeds between 50 and 100 yards a minute. As many as 10 different colors can be printed in one continuous operation, but each colour must have a separate roller.

The design is cut into the surface of copper rollers; by varying the depth of the engraving on the roller the shade depth can be altered. Sharpness of line and fine detail can be achieved this way. A typical printing machine has a large padded drum or cylinder, which is surrounded by a series of copper rollers, each with its own dye trough and doctor blade that scrapes away excess dye.

The tubular screens rotate at the same velocity as the fabric, the print paste is distributed inside a tubular screen, which is forced into the fabric as it is pressed between the screen and a printing blanket (a continuous rubber belt). It picks up colour from the engraved area of each roller in sequence. The printed cloth is dried immediately and conveyed to an oven that sets the dye. Knitted fabric is mostly printed in this method as it does not pull or stretch the fabric.

In flat screen printing, a screen on which print paste has been applied is lowered onto a section of fabric. A squeegee then moves across the screen, forcing the print paste through the screen and into the fabric. The screen is the image carrier made from a porous mesh stretched tightly over a metal frame. A positive stencil using negative art work is produced on the mesh either manually or photo chemically. Ink is then forced through the fine mesh openings using a squeegee that is drawn across the screen allowing print paste to pass through only the areas where no stencil is applied.

Block printing is a traditional process dating back to India in the 12th century. Wooden blocks made of seasoned teak in different shapes and sizes are cut by trained craftsmen. Each block has a wooden handle and two or three holes drilled into the block to the passage of air and release of excess print paste.
Fabric is stretched over a printing table and fastened with small pins. Printing starts from left to right, first the colour is evened out in the tray and then the block is dipped in. Then the block is applied to the fabric with careful registration and pressure is applied.

Multiple colour designs are labour intensive and require a lot of skill to register the prints exactly.
Colour variation is hard to avoid with this method as print ink can vary in quality of depth or colour. The Japanese took wood block printing to new levels and developed unparalleled skill in the construction of fine delicate prints.

This is essentially transferring an image to fabric from a paper carrier. When heat and pressure are applied to this paper the inks are transferred. Some transfers are topical, and the image sits on the surface of the fabric. Other transfers are absorbed into the fibres of the fabric. Heat transfer printing is clean and environmentally safe. The only by-product is the paper carrier. It is the perfect print method for short run and sample production, but can also be used for batch production as well.

Dye sublimation allows photo lab quality picture printing. During the dye sublimation printing process, an image is digitally printed in reverse with dye sublimation toners or inks onto media. That image is then placed on top of a fabric and subjected to high heat and pressure to form a heat press. The dye sublimation toners or inks sublimate the inks go from a solid state to a gaseous state without becoming liquid in between and flow into the fabric, dyeing the threads.

This creates a gentle gradation of colour and does not distort or fade over time.

Discharge printing is one method of resist printing and involves using a chemical paste called a disperse dye. It must be used with a reactive dye as a ground colour for the process to work. It also has to be cured or fixed with steam so the dye reacts with the fabric and causes a colour reaction. Discharge printing produces the brightest, lightest prints on dark-coloured garments and can be very striking. This method can only be used on natural fibres and fabrics that will discharge colour. Another method of resist printing is Batik. Natural materials such as cotton or silk are used as they absorb the wax that is applied in the dye resisting process. The fabrics must be of a high thread count (densely woven) for best results.

Although experts disagree on the origins of Batik, it is very popular in Indonesia and Africa. The cloth that is used for batik is washed and boiled in water many times before the wax can be applied so that all traces of starches, lime, chalk and other sizing materials are removed. Before modern-day techniques, the cloth would have been pounded with a wooden mallet or ironed to make it smooth and supple so it could receive the wax design. The designer uses a tjanting (wax pen) to draw the design on the cloth. The wax is kept fluid in a melting pot.

After the wax has been applied, the fabric is ready for the dye bath. Today most batik factories use large concrete vats, above the vats are ropes with pulleys that the fabric is draped over after it has been dipped into the dye bath. The amount of time it is left in the bath determines the hue of the colour (longer for deeper colours)

Printing techniques are renowned for their damage to the environment and the health of the workforce producing them. There is a lot of washing preparation done to the fabric before it can be printed on and this sends chemicals into the air and water and pollutes the outside environment. A typical process will often include sequestrates, alkalis, bleaching agents, stabilisers, catalysts, crease-resisting agents, acid dyes, exhausting agents, soaping agents and softeners. Probably 2030 chemicals per process. Harsh and hazardous chemicals are used in the dyeing and printing methods of fabrics and toxins like carbon monoxide, carbon dioxide, sulphur dioxide and zinc oxides carcinogenic are commonly found in these processes. Transfer printing is the most environmentally friendly form of printing onto fabric and also the most cost effective. As a result it is fast becoming the textile manufacturers choice for the future.

The most commonly used processes for imparting colour to cotton are piece dyeing and yarn dyeing. In piece dyeing, which is used primarily for fabrics that are to be a solid colour, a continuous length of dry cloth is passed full-width through a trough of hot dye solution. The cloth then goes between padded rollers that squeeze in the colour evenly and remove the excess liquid. In one variation of this basic method, the fabric, in a rope-like coil, is processed on a reel that passes in and out of a dye beck or vat.

Yarn dyeing, which occurs before the cloth is woven or knitted, is used to produce gingham checks, plaids, woven stripes and other special effects. Blue dyed warp yarns, for example, are combined with white filling yarns in denim construction.

One of the most commonly used yarn-dyeing methods is package dyeing. In this system, yarn is wound on perforated cylinders or packages and placed on vertical spindles in a round dyeing machine.
Dye solution is forced alternately from the outside of the packages inward and from the inside out under pressure. Computers are used increasingly in dyeing processes to formulate and match colours with greater speed and accuracy.

Finishing, as the term implies, is the final step in fabric production. Hundreds of finishes can be applied to textiles, and the methods of application are as varied as the finishes.
Cotton fabrics are probably finished in more different ways than any other type of fabrics. Some finishes change the look and feel of the fabric, while others add special characteristics such as durable press, water repellency, flame resistance, shrinkage control and others. Several different finishes may be applied to a single fabric.

Olduvai stone chopping tool

The discovery of this stone tool helped to prove that humans evolved in Africa in the British Museum. It This chopping tool is the oldest humanly made object
could be used for many purposes including chopping bones, plants and wood. By using a stone hammer to knock flakes off of a pebble our ancestors could make a tool with a sharp, functional edge. Olduvai is part of the great East African Rift Valley torn open by massive earthquakes. Many skulls and bones of our early ancestors have been found along this valley.

Can we be human without objects?

The invention of the first tools is one of the most important moments in human history. Making, using and sharing things played a key role in developing human behaviour. The ability to make tools allowed humans to adapt to new environments and out-compete other animals. Gradually it would lead to humans becoming the most successful animal in the world. All modern technology began with these first chopping tools

Richard Leakey
"To me it's a question of being able to look backward and give the present a root... To give meaning to where we are today, we need to look at where we've have come from." (Richard Leakey, in National Geographic, February 1998)

Kusuma Barnett, Head of Volunteers, British Museum

When you look at this object you might ask yourself what is it and why is it in the Museum? If you were able to hold it in your hand as I did in 2005 and find how comfortably it fits into your palm (like a computer mouse!), you would know straight away that this was made to be held by a person. I never thought I would have the opportunity to handle something made nearly 2 million years ago. It was just like touching history. I was one of a team of volunteers which helped visitors to the Museum handle this object. Most of our visitors were just as excited as I was at being able to hold something that was so old. Some visitors were close to tears. Some were sceptical: was it really made by man and not a piece of rock? I was able to show the visitors the sharp and uniform cutting edge and discuss with them the possibility of how it could have been made by deliberately knocking flakes off the sides using a hard stone a bit like a hammer. In a letter written to the Museum, a visitor said: The opportunity to hold one of the oldest human artefacts was a unique feeling, and I can honestly say that I have rarely found an object fit so neatly into my hand. It was the same for many of our visitors who handled the chopping tool. It is one of the most memorable experiences of my time at the Museum.

Professor Clive Gamble, Archaeologist, Royal Holloway University of London

This stone tells two stories: one about the fossil ancestor who made the tool and the other about the fossil hunter who found it. Is it having objects that makes us human? The ancestor and the archaeologist are separated by almost two million years. They are similar because both walked upright and used tools. However, they differ greatly in the size of their brains and the sophistication of their technology. So are they both human? Louis Leakey, the flamboyant Kenyan-born fossil hunter and champion of the importance of Africa for human evolution, was 28 when he found this stone tool. Not everyone believed that they were ancient artefacts and he had to wait another thirty years before it could be scientifically proven. At the time, he claimed that these ancient Olduvai people, for whom 28 was a ripe old age, were our ancestors because they had things, like this tool. But crows, sea otters, monkeys and apes all make and use tools and we dont call them human. In fact, these ancestors had brains not much larger than a chimpanzee almost three times smaller than our own. So, if it wasnt big brains that made us tool users or tools alone that made us human, was it our minds and imagination? But how can a stone tool help us to understand the extent of the human mind? Certainly, it cannot tell us about a capacity for language or a passion of religious beliefs. However, the action of flaking the stone repeatedly to create a sharp-edged tool points to other imaginative powers - appreciating the properties of materials, predicting the outcome of physical actions, and understanding that an alternative point of view exists other than your own and acting accordingly. In other words our ancestors had an understanding of how other minds work, something no animal has and which children develop by the age of four. To complete Leakeys tale, his discoveries were questioned and his long search for our African origins, as predicted by Darwin, went on and on. His task was to convince others and eventually he triumphed. That was his story.

The toolmaker had other concerns to deal with. As this simple tool shows, he or she was just beginning to appreciate the potential of being human, moving beyond the mental ability of apes and crows and into the foothills of the human imagination. Brains are needed to make objects. But two million years ago a new story began that married brains to objects in such a way that together the human mind evolved. ...Less