The winds of change

Once upon a time, there were two gals with a dream. Today the story continues…

Left Gina Pantastico and Michelle Engel in 2009 for Martha Stewart Living Magazine

As the story goes, back in the early spring of 2009, two long time friends and colleagues sat at a kitchen table brainstorming over bagels; when breakfast was over, Cloud9 Fabrics had been born.  

A lot of you are familiar with our tale. A lot of you know us personally. You’ve either been there from Day 1 or you’ve found us since. We could not  have built this business without your encouragement and support all along the way. 

Today we share that our journey is taking a new path. We have partnered with Ocean State Innovations (OSI) and P&B Textiles with as much enthusiasm as we had on that propitious first morning in 2009. We love a good opportunity, and when such a one as this presented itself, we knew in our hearts and minds, that we had to seize it. 

As many of you know, owning a small business can be challenging. In particular, infrastructure and financial challenges often have greater impacts than on larger firms. Becoming part of the OSI family will provide Cloud9 Fabrics and our sister brand, Felicity Fabrics, a fostering, established and reliable foundation that will help our brands flourish and will bring about long term stability for our employees, product and our customers.  

We want to ensure you that we at Cloud9 will remain committed to the use of organic cotton and continue offering beautiful prints and the exceptional quality and customer service you’ve come to expect. This will not change. Michelle and Gina, and the rest of our women-strong team, will continue to be the driving force of Cloud9 Fabrics and Felicity Fabrics and look forward to a bright future with our new fabric family. 

With our thanks and gratitude,
Michelle and Gina

More of what you love from us coming your way!

#mindfulmaterialsmatter

The post News from your friends at Cloud9 Fabrics appeared first on Cloud9 Fabrics.

A message from Michelle Engel and Gina Pantastico,
Co-founders and Co-owners, Cloud9 Fabrics

We founded Cloud9 with a commitment to producing organic cotton fabrics and we have been doing so for over 13 years. You may not often hear us talk about our motivation, but it is not because it’s unimportant. From our perspective, it is just what we do and we don’t feel the need to boast about something that makes us who we are. Right now, however, we will take a moment to pat ourselves on the back, because over these last few years it has been a struggle to keep a business like ours afloat. As you probably know, organic cotton is more expensive to produce and therefore more costly to buy. Global rising inflation increases it further. Yet, despite the challenges we have stayed the course on products that are less harmful to the environment and we remain committed to thoughtful sourcing and production practices. Our world could use more kindness and compassion, and we genuinely feel that in our small way we contribute to that.

We feel great joy in offering beautifully-designed, high-quality fabrics with a conscience. Based on our history of success, we can see that you value our efforts, too.

Cloud9 continues for one main reason: You. We are grateful for the support you’ve given us. Thank you for the encouragement to go forward even when we felt it was a challenge. You give us optimism for the future.

When purchasing Cloud9 products, you are supporting a team of seven energetic women who drive Cloud9 through their boundless talents. Consider all the things that need to happen in order to run an international fabric company: design, production, sales, distribution, marketing and communication. All of that, and more, is  carried out by just a handful of committed people. We hope it’s apparent that all of us here love what we do. 

When we, Michelle and Gina, struck out on our own, we promised ourselves to create a pleasant working environment in reaction to the hectic 9-6 jobs we held in New York City for years. We value family, mental health, flexibility and down time, for ourselves and our team. Even during the pandemic, we tried to float above the current with resiliency and lightness. We did what we could to keep the product moving, but we always put our staff first despite the challenging setbacks of the times. We are so thankful to each of the hard-working women who helped us keep our fabric available to you.

After 13 years, we are delighted with the business and work environment we have created, the connections and relationships we have built, and the product we continue to produce. And we’ll say it: we’re proud of ourselves; two women who wanted to do our part for the world by producing mindful materials.

At Cloud9, there are three ideals we strive to stand behind.

MINDFULNESS – Life is a series of choices. What we choose to say, how we act and what we do have impact. The products we choose to use matter. Being MINDFUL requires a moment of reflection or contemplation in order to put one’s best foot forward and it rewards all.

KINDNESS is imperative when we interact with all living creatures including ourselves. Unfortunately, we haven’t always shown kindness to the Earth. Although she can be amazingly resilient, that does not give us license to abuse the planet we call home.

CONSIDERATION – Being CONSIDERATE is placing the interests of others before one’s own. A thoughtful word, an outstretched hand or a moment of empathy enriches us far more than living only for ourselves. Choosing practices that are less damaging to the Earth benefits us all and is an experience that can feed the soul.

Thanks for listening. We have to get back to work!

— Michelle and Gina

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Print instructions. Download Here.

This free project is suitable for any occasion, but we wanted to get festive with Tinsel by Clairice Gifford. An easy and fashionable Bottle Gift Bag would be perfect for a house warming, birthday or anniversary! It’s quickly becoming one of our personal go-to projects.

The post Make it Sew | Bottle Gift Bag appeared first on Cloud9 Fabrics.

Sweetly paired with Underwater by Elizabeth Olwen, these little drawstring bags are really handy for holding smaller things, gift bags or even as a little purse for the littles. Here’s how to make your own.

Print out the PDF pattern pieces here.

Outer body:

Tail – cut 2 (solid)
Body – cut 2 (print)
Head – cut 2 (solid)
Batting for tail – cut 1
Lining – cut 2 (contrast solid)
2 buttons for eyes
2 18” drawstrings (1yd total)

Directions:

Use 1/4” seam allowance unless otherwise noted.

Outer body

1. Sew tail to body, and body to head to make two full outer sides of the bag. Press all seams towards tail.
2. Sew button to head in area located in diagram.
3. Topstitch along the lower edge of the body/head seam.
4. With right sides together and laying the tail/batting on top of tail and sew along outer edge, sides and tail, keeping the “mouth” of fish open. Snip corners of tail and curves, turn inside out and press.
5. Topstitch at the tail/body seam. through all thicknesses (sealing off the tail).
6. For tail details, stitch along the lines, or create your own stitched design.
7. At mouth, turn edge 1/2” inside and press.

Lining

1. Sew sides and bottom, except for the area between the 2 marked points. Press seams open.
2. Turn right side out in order to topstitch around the holes as shown – this keeps the seam allowance tacked down. Then turn it back to wrong side out.
3. Fold on the line noted on pattern toward wrong (currently the outside) side and press.

Assembly

1. Slip the lining into the outer shell. Line up the opening of the holes on the sides so they meet the folded edge of the outer head. The “lips” should be exposed about 1/2”
2. Pin around and ease any excess of the outer body to the lining.
3. Topstitch at the top edge of the outer body.
4. Take one of the drawstrings and enter/exit for the right and tie a knot. Take the other and enter/exit from the left and knot. Pull both drawstrings to close.

The post Make it Sew | Drawstring Fish Bag appeared first on Cloud9 Fabrics.

This is only a template. You can scale it to any size you like but this is printed at 100% the size you see in the photo.

Use whatever appliqué methods you like best on whatever size panel you care for. You can also make an entire quilt by piecing blocks together. For a more whimsical wall hanging, try some fancy trims. Sky’s the limit! Enjoy.

Download the 4 page template here.

The post Make It Sew | Unicorn and Stars Wall Hanging appeared first on Cloud9 Fabrics.

 

a. Wrap Harness Ankle Piece around the boot ankle. On the front side of the raw edged opening, tuck under the raw edge into the tube of the harness. On the back side of the raw edged opening, slip the raw edge into the front side tube. You may want to trim some of the excess fabric. When it fits nice and lays smooth, pin well in place. (You will remove the harness to sew, so do not pin it to the boot itself)

b. Wrap Harness Arch Piece under the arch and lay over the Harness Ankle Piece, pinning in place for marking (on both sides). Using erasable fabric marker/chalk, mark points A, B, and C.

e. Using a seam ripper, pick open the stitches between the two A and B marks you made (on both sides).

f. Slip the Harness Arch Piece into the slots you created and slide in up to mark C. Pin in place (on both sides). Topstitch the arch to Harness Ankle Piece.16. Slip Harness back onto the boot and sew a large button onto the ankle through

all layers on the front side of the boot

The post Make it Sew | Harness Boot Christmas Stocking appeared first on Cloud9 Fabrics.

Sewing with our laminates is very similar to sewing with cotton. With a few small tips you can construct any items you would with other fabrics.

• Using a resin foot attachment to your sewing machine or a similar type of foot that might be suggested by the maker of your sewing machine is essential or top stitching.
• Use a test swatch of the fabrics (wrong sides together as in this pattern)
• Adjust tension & stitch size (longer stitches work well for top stitching)
• Guiding the fabrics from behind and the front of the foot will keep your pieces from moving

______

Laminate Shower Cap by Catherine Zebrowski

Materials:

The post Tutorial | Laminated Cotton Shower Cap appeared first on Cloud9 Fabrics.

Grey Abbey was our first collaboration with Elizabeth Olwen who has gone on to produce some our most beautiful and popular fabrics. The Ribbon Box quilt is also our most downloaded Make It Sew project. Furthermore, we get more requests for this quilt kit than for any other we’ve developed (and it’s worth noting that we do not even sell kits). So, it made sense that we bundle up some kits while we can.

But hurry, this is a limited edition kit (38 to be exact!) and once they’re gone, they’re gone – sadly, a number of these fabrics are no longer in stock.

To order, follow this link. The cost is $74.95 + shipping. International orders welcome. The kit includes a hardcopy of the pattern, the prints for the topper and the binding, but it does not include the white and backing.

The post Limited Edition | Ribbon Box Quilt Kits appeared first on Cloud9 Fabrics.

Mo Willems’ Knuffle Bunny was a great fabric to use for young ones since it combines a favorite character and hearts!

1. We printed out some sayings for a computer onto a stiff paper stock. This isn’t necessary, since you can always handwrite your Valentine’s Day wishes. As for size, we made the paper portion smaller so we could use fabric as a frame. So in this case, the finished size is for a 4″ envelope and the paper squares are about 3″ leaving 1″ in fabric border.

2. We cut fabric scraps roughly at about 5″ squares – enough so we didn’t have to line things up too strictly before sewing. Layering fabrics wrong sides together and placed the paper on top. We did not pin things because we didn’t want to leave a mark in the paper, but you could use spray glues if thought it would help for littler hands.

* We took the extra step in adding a layer of white fabric between the prints so they wouldn’t show though.

3. Using any stitch you like and sewing with the paper facing up, stitch around the edge of the paper. Trim loose ends.

4. Finally, trim the fabrics to the desired size with pinking shears.

5. For a finishing touch, we added fabric “stamps”.

The post Make it Sew | Stitched Valentines appeared first on Cloud9 Fabrics.