The Process

Inspired by nature. Created by hand.

Very few linens today are block-printed by hand. If they are, they’re extraordinarily expensive. Most linens are silkscreened with computer-aided designs, which means their patterns are precise and unvaried. Machine-printed linens are perfect to the ruler but not always pleasing to the eye. Sometimes, they can be downright monotonous.
 
Which is where our Michigan-made table linens happily diverge. Because nature is anything but monotonous. Our linens are block printed by hand in a unique, three-step process by Joann Condino and the artists at Three Pines Studio in Cross Village, Michigan.

Step #1

International artists hand-carve designs with chisels onto blocks of wood. A third-generation Italian woodcarver, Filippo Romagnoli, hand-carved our Florentine line using local and Tuscan wood from sustainable forests. In addition, artisan wood carvers from a village collective in India also carve wood blocks for the studio. Regardless of who carves the wood block, it is easy to spot the hand of the maker once you know what you’re looking for.

Step #2

Three Pines Studio artists then take high-quality, 100% flax linen that has an amazing hand and feel, and gets softer and softer with each washing. The artist first hand-inks the woodblock with one or more color-fast textile dyes and hand-places the block on the fabric. She repeats this process, slowly and painstakingly, as long as she needs to create a beautiful pattern or patterns.

Step #3

Finally, the finished design and dyes are heat set to last a lifetime.
 

Certainly, it is a time-consuming, artistic labor of love. And the finished piece, if deemed extraordinary enough to offer for sale, is truly a one-of-a-kind piece at an extremely affordable price. Better yet, it will carry the happy memories of every meal shared with friends and family, generation after generation.
 
In essence, the studio has married a centuries-old tradition with modern colors and designs to create stunning, contemporary heirlooms.