“Any fool can make things bigger and more complicated… it takes a touch of genius – and a lot of courage to move in the opposite direction.” ~ Ernst F. Schumacher
We thought it would be useful to talk about some of the most common t-shirt design trends we’ve seen in Custom T-Shirt Design Trends.
While designing custom t-shirts, “Designer’s Block” can happen, even to the best of us. Even the most creative people in the world aren’t always able to come up with relevant, efficient, and unique custom t-shirt designs all the time.
Lately, we’ve seen 4 common “themes” and trends in the designs that come through. One attribute they all share, though, is that the designs stay simple (per the quote above by Ernst F. Schumacher)… a one color print with artwork that doesn’t have a lot of intricate, complicated details. Part of the advantage of printing on apparel is that the shirt and fabric can say just as much about your company, campaign, group, etc., as the design that is to be printed! Keeping the design simple will save you money and allow for a cleaner print – two huge advantages for any project.
This is probably the most common trend we see. So much can be done with incorporating a circle or circular design – from putting text around a circle, to making a circle out of the text, the options are endless and we’d love to help you design the perfect circular custom t-shirt design if you need help.
An ideal print size for a circle design is between 9 to 11 inches wide (so it’s not too small, and not too large).
Similar to the Circle Design trend you saw above, framing your art with a box or lines around the rest of the design is a really popular option. Visually, it is very easy on the eyes to keep the focus on the design elements within the framing, and really can be the “missing piece” from a design that just isn’t quite right without it.
This option works really well with simple design elements placed in the “quadrants” created in the cross-hatch design. Clean, block fonts are often used for any letters/text, and simple one-color filled or outlined objects work best for the remaining areas.
This trend is the most recent one we have seen. When done with the right type of artwork, it can end up looking really awesome.
For this type of printing to look good, we would want to be using art that is taller than it is wide (and usually much taller than wide… not super close). We also see that the majority of the artwork that get’s printed off-center is primarily text-based! So, pick a super cool font to use and create your multiple line text artwork, and the off-center printing will come to life!
More ideas to come…
Stay tuned next week for a look at some of the hottest font styles to use for printing on apparel and creating an awesome custom design. In the meantime, if you’d like to consult with one of our Coed Monkey Brand Specialists, you can either start a live-chat with one of our dedicated reps, give us a call (1-877-T-Shirt-1), drop us a Contact Message, or start an order right on our site.
PS… Wondering which t-shirt might be right for your next big custom t-shirt order? Get one of our Soft T-Shirt Sample Packs to help decide!
We can’t wait to see the design that you want to move forward with!