Blog / business

Happy Monday, all! I hope you all had a nice, relaxing weekend. I'm so excited to let you know that I've added six brand-new Maze and Vale designs to the shop! Leslie Keating, the talented woman behind Maze and Vale, is a prolific and popular independent fabric designer based in Australia. I first began stocking her fabrics this past winter, and they've proven to be quite popular!


Each batch of Maze and Vale fabric I carry is exclusive to Salty Oat; you won't be able to find these color combinations anywhere else. For this latest batch, I selected two different color base cloths and six different ink colors. While each panel works well on its own, I also decided to create two bundles within the group, which coordinate together well and could easily be used in the same project.


For the first bundle, I selected a spectrum of grays---pale gray, dove gray, and charcoal---printed on a white organic cotton base cloth. I personally love using low-volume prints in place of solid white in many of my quilts, and I had that in mind when I selected these prints and colors. Wouldn't they look beautiful in this Pow-Wow Quilt?


For the second bundle, I selected rich jewel tones---deep peacock, camellia, and eggplant---which were printed on an organic pale mushroom gray base cloth. These bold prints were inspired by fabrics I saw while visiting Japan more than a year ago, and I'd love to pair them with bits of rich leather to create zipper pouches. I think the large pink polka dots in particular would create an especially beautiful foldover clutch.

I hope you love these prints as much as I do! And please be sure to tag any projects you make with fabrics from the shop with the hashtag #saltyoat, so that I can see them and share them!

So here's some news for you: my little family is moving to New England! While our four years in North Carolina have been amazing (and filled with barbeque, biscuits, and great friends), we're ready for new adventures and are looking forward to relocating to the greater Boston area.

Over the next few weeks, I'll be making the thrilling/scary transition from a full-time Spoonflower employee, to a...

In the coming weeks, I'll be launching the Salty Oat newsletter, the source for shop news, exclusive discounts, and announcements about upcoming events, including classes and craft fairs. Each monthly issue will also include link round-ups, designer interviews, and behind-the-scenes shots of the studio. I've been brainstorming features and gathering up lots of fun links, which I can't wait to...

Though I posted about it on Instagram, I realized that I never shared the news here on the blog: I am now stocking a selection of five unique prints by Maze and Vale in the shop!


Leslie is the powerhouse behind Maze and Vale, designing and printing all of the fabrics that are sold by this Australia-based company. She is also the organizer of the yearly Handprinted: a fabric swap, which I've had the pleasure of participating in twice (blogged here and here).


I worked with Leslie to select the designs and colorways you see in the shop, each of which are printed on an organic quilting-weight basecloth. These design-and-color combinations are completely unique to Salty Oat; you can't purchase them anywhere else! Additionally, Leslie recently announced that she'll be retiring two of the designs I stock---Gathering and Love Hearts---so now is definitely the time to grab them if you love them as much as I do.


Happy sewing!