The Décor Guide: Our Go-To Products

In the burgeoning market of décor, the possibility for creative application is quickly expanding, and advances in technology have increased the selection of products available. To help you navigate this process, we’ve created a page of the Top Décor Products You Need Now as an easy guide to the essential tools for this growing business opportunity.

From Wall Murals to Floor Graphics, we highlight the décor products that will offer your customers a range of creative, artistic and eye-catching media.

Check out this new décor page today for information on products for:

  • Wall Murals
  • Canvas Prints
  • Window Shades & Room Dividers
  • Window Graphics
  • Floor Graphics
  • Lamp Shades
  • Tapestries

Click HERE to go to the products page!

Afghanistan Comes to Life with Inkjet Printed Fabric

Photographic exhibition printed on fabric
Beyond the Mountains: The Interior Life of Afghanistan by Lisa Schnellinger chronicles the everyday life of Afghanistan's people. This exhibition at the Sharptop Arts Association's gallery in Jasper, Ga., features hanging photographic tapestries printed on LexJet Water-Resistant Cloth by John Seibel Photography.

Lisa Schnellinger is a globetrotting journalist and photographer whose engagement in Afghanistan goes far beyond the scope of her work. Schnellinger has become involved in the rebuilding of Afghanistan, founding the Pajhwok Afghan News agency and raising funds to build a girls’ school.

Photographic tapestries for a photo exhibitSchnellinger wanted to tell the story of Afghanistan through photography using an interactive art exhibition as the means to do so. Having seen other exhibitions printed on a silk material, Schnellinger turned to fellow Georgia photographer John Seibel, owner of John Seibel Photography in Dawsonville, Ga.

“I did some regular prints for her prior to this project. I was fascinated with her new project. Lisa told me that for the past ten years she’s had a vision of a show telling the story of the people of Afghanistan from a non-political point of view. She knew I had an Epson 7900 printer and wanted to know if I could print it on silk,” explains Seibel. “I did a lot of research, including at LexJet, and they suggested LexJet Water-Resistant Satin Cloth. One of the nice things about LexJet is that they guarantee satisfaction: if it doesn’t work for your purposes and you send it back within 30 days it’s no harm, no foul. I had never printed on a fabric before, so that was good to know.”

Once the primary print material for the show was chosen, Schnellinger and Seibel worked together to narrow the images down from 100-150 to the 20 or so that would be printed for the exhibition, called Beyond the Mountains: The Interior Life of Afghanistan.

Printing photos on fabric for an exhibition“The goal was to have them produced near life-size and floating in the room so that when people walked through they felt like they were interacting with the people she photographed in Afghanistan,” says Seibel. “We did some test prints on regular luster paper and then strips on the Water-Resistant Satin Cloth. Once we felt like we had the profile and adjustments right, we began printing. LexJet does a great job of producing profiles for their materials, and the profile for the Water-Resistant Satin Cloth was right on the money for my Epson 7900.”

Schellinger designed the layout for the exhibition, which included an audio tour. Attendees could grab an mp3 player with an audio track Schellinger narrated that provided background and stories about the images featured at the exhibition. The combination of hanging fabric tapestries and the audio tour created a dynamic, flowing, interactive and three-dimensional experience.

Photo exhibition about Afghanistan
Lisa Schnellinger, journalist and photographer, who created the exhibition Beyond the Mountains: The Interior Life of Afghanistan.

“The color resolution on the fabric prints came out very nice. You could lay it on the table and it looked good, but it didn’t blow you away until you hung it up in the room and then had the light interacting with the prints,” says Seibel. “I’ve done other prints with Water-Resistant Satin Cloth, including an early morning marina scene. I have it lit from behind and all the light areas in the print just glow. It’s a fantastic medium to print this type of project on. That’s one thing that LexJet does for us; they give us great advice on what products to use for what type project. I’d also like to try LEDs behind it to create the glow artificially.”

Fabric Fanatics: Creative and Colorful Fabric Applications by FBIS

Printing signs for an art festivalAt Fine Balance Imaging Studios (FBIS) in Langley, Wash., on picturesque Whidbey Island, the watchwords are quality and variety. The studio images everything from fine art and photography to commercial and special event graphics, using an amazing range of inkjet printable materials from LexJet to better serve its clientele.

An ongoing project for Fine Balance Imaging is the annual summer art festival in Langely called Choochokam, which is Hopi for “gathering of stars.” FBIS co-owner Joe Menth chairs the design committee and prints just about everything imaginable for the festival, from directionals and schedules to booth signage.

Printing fabric banners for an art festivalWith a long history experimenting with different materials, Menth employs his materials and color management knowledge and arsenal of LexJet media to create a colorful and informative venue for the thousands that swarm to the island for the festival.

A few years ago the look of the festival underwent a makeover with Menth heading up the design committee, employing a metal artist to create custom ironworks for the row markers at the event based on the signature design created by Chris Baldwin.

Menth chose to use LexJet Water-Resistant Satin Cloth for the banners attached to the ironwork, and says the material has held up to weather and abuse after years of being used and re-used. For replacement banners where needed, as well as crosswalk, booth and artist banners, Menth used LexJet’s new Poly Select Light fabric.

Printing wall hanging tapestries
Dan O'Halloran's fine art pieces, The Archer and The Kingfisher, printed by FBIS on LexJet Poly Select Light Fabric.

Other areas of the festival were decorated with Photo Tex for non-permanent, easy-to-apply-and-peel-off applications like schedules at the main event stage, the fronts and sides of shuttle buses and posters applied at the ferry terminal on huge posts to direct people to the free shuttles.

Fine Balance Imaging also used LexJet TOUGHcoat AquaVinyl PSA for the primary information booths (which Menth also designed) and some other non-adhesive applications on LexJet TOUGHcoat Water-Resistant Polypropylene, though these applications were replaced with Poly Select Light for this year’s festival for the look and feel of fabric, plus a cost savings over other media options.

“I’m impressed with the fine art quality I can get with the Poly Select fabric. You can see the details as crisp as just about anything else we print to. It’s also a nice, affordable material for large wall hangings when a client doesn’t want to invest in a more expensive material,” says Menth.

Printing tapestries with an inkjet printer
Close-up of the detail achieved on Dan O'Halloran's The Kingfisher with LexJet Poly Select Light and the Epson Stylus Pro 9900.

Just such an opportunity came up recently when local fine artist Dan O’Halloran wanted wall-sized hanging reproductions of his work. Menth printed The Archer and The Kingfisher for him on Poly Select Light on the studio’s Epson Stylus Pro 9900 at 44 inches wide by five feet tall. One of them sold almost immediately.

Menth says, “He was one of the first artists whose work we carried in our art gallery before we started the printing studio, and we’ve remained friends for many years. While he’s still working his way through his old offset lithography limited editions of all of his original pencil drawings, he is now starting to explore alternative processes with us, printing on fabrics and polyester cloth. We’ve done large-scale tapestry-style hangings for Dan and other fine artists on machine-washable cottons and silks, but the price point was simply too high for the perceived value the artwork could be priced for at retail. The Poly Select Light cloth has become an excellent alternative for a flowing fabric look without the associated costs of real cottons and silks we’ve printed on in the past.”

Printing fabric banners with an inkjet printerFBIS also hangs three fabric portraits along the side of the building outside the second story windows. The banner on the left, printed on Poly Select Light, is a reproduction of 19th Century Japanese artwork the studio prints. A whopping 50 percent of all retail sales of the prints from an ongoing exhibition started last September by FBIStudios, by the way, go to the Japanese Relief Fund for victims of the tsunami. 

The “Ukiyo-e: Pictures of the Floating World” exhibit of Japanese woodblock print reproductions hangs throughout the building inside, with prints on Moab Moenkopi Unryu Kozo (Mulberry) Paper with bamboo hanging rods, as well as the ever-popular Water Resistant Satin Cloth.

Large hangings of Hokusai and Hiroshige, as well as many other lesser-known 19th Century Japanese artists are represented, care of the public domain imagery available through the Library of Congress.  Much care has been taken to keep the original aesthetic of the work, with minor retouching done to clean up the images, but without the over-saturation and over-sharpening that appears on the gaudy reproductions of Japanese art found on most large-scale retail poster shops and websites.

The resulting images are available not only in the building where FBIS has their printing and photography/classroom studios, but also on their new website, GratitudeGallery.com, where they are adding many of their clients’ work at no commission; artists receive 100 percent of the retail sales minus the print cost.

The middle building banner image on Poly Select Light is a rainbow, representing the color magic FBIS works for its clientele. The third and latest banner is a photo of the island’s lavender fields, a picture-perfect scene printed on LexJet Poly Select Light that captures the printing expertise of the studio and the island’s charm. 

Inkjet printing fabric bannersFine Balance Imaging has been donating the printing of building banners for various community events since the day they moved into the historic Bayview Cash Store building, but always at a cost that prevented the banners from being changed out more than once every four to six months.

Previously, the banners were printed on Tyvek, Polypropylene, or Water Resistant Satin Cloth. With the introduction of the Poly Select Light cloth, however, all future banners will be run on the versatile and cost-effective material.

“The banners get a lot of attention and it’s pretty neat having something that big with all that color hanging from the building,” says FBIS co-owner Nancy McFarland. “We usually leave those out on the building for a month or two. They get a lot of weather and wind, so it’s a great durability test.”

Printing Japanese art with an inkjet printerFBIS prints all of its work on its three Epson printers, a 4800, 9800 and 9900. Menth says the printers, coupled with the ImagePrint RIP, ensure color consistency and accuracy on each job, and that’s what FBIS is all about.

“I love the printers, and we use ImagePrint 8.0, which is beautiful because we can download profiles for just about any printable material in the industry and for any lighting condition we could run across. It also allows us to run these ridiculously long banners,” adds Menth.