If you have been to an SGIA Expo or other major trade show—or are en route to this week’s FESPA Digital in Amsterdam—you know that textile printing is all the rage, and more and more traditional wide-format printing equipment manufacturers are introducing units that will print on fabrics. Soft signage has also been an oft-bruited printing application for the past couple of years and continues to grow. As a result, questions about textile printing abound, so this week’s feature will offer a general primer on textile printing.

First of all, what do we mean by “textile printing”? In general, we can identify three distinct categories:

Sign and display—This category would include banners and posters, trade show graphics, point-of-sale/point-of-purchase (POP/POS) displays, flags, outdoor graphics, and so on. This is also where we would classify “soft signage” in all its myriad forms.