Heather Ross "Prints" Book Review - and it is EPIC.

The book, that is.



I am a huge, huge, huge fan of Heather Ross, and bought the book sight unseen.  It's like being "blinded by the designer label"  for fabric geeks.   It does not disappoint!  After ripping open the package, I'll admit I was a little bummed that it wasn't a thick, heavy book stuffed with a pocket for patterns and tons and tons of pages.   Upon further inspection, it's relatively thin because everything I expected is in the back on a DVD (phew!)

Did I say everything?  Yes, everything.   (Well, almost.  I did not see the Mendocino seahorses available as a .jpg.  Her new one, Nursery Versery, is also not included)  The 50+ designs alluded to in the title are 32 .jpg and .pdf images of her previously published and out of print designs, free for you to use.  There's a graphic index in the back for you to check and see what you're getting in case you're some kind of freak who would only purchase it for that one fabric and not like the rest.  You can upload the images at Spoonflower and have the fabric all over again, or print them professionally as wallpaper, even make stationery out of them.  She gives directions on how to do all of these in the projects section of the book.  See these pretty graphics in my post?  All from the DVD.   I still can't get over how generous (and unprecedented?) the book is.  Her beloved and out of print fabrics have been going for $20 a fat quarter on Etsy... but no longer.   (Now I can stop side-eyeing those gorgeous mermaids in Jacquie Gering and Katie Pederson's Supernova Quilt for being out of print and out of reach.)



As for the projects, they are not anything novel.  Tea towels, votive holders, nightgown, Mod Podge projects--nothing groundbreaking here.  But that's not the point.  The point of the projects in the book is to showcase beautiful ways to use her images.  It's not called how to sew or make stuff, it's called Heather Ross PRINTS.  Here they are, and here's a way to plaster your stuff with them.  She's not trying to teach sewing (although there are the perfunctory sewing basics lesson pages, which I suspect the publishers feel obligated to include and nobody in their right mind would use not knowing how to sew in the first place).  With that in mind, the projects are all great ideas in terms of beauty, utility, and the right combination of ease and difficulty (nothing intimidating!) and I can't wait to get started.



If prints and projects aren't enough, Heather gives a brief tutorial on how to use Photoshop to pencil in and repeat your own designs and talks a bit about what it's like for her as an artist.

Verdict:   Buy it if you're a fan of Heather Ross!  Worth every penny for card-carrying fans.