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MEBANE -- Spoonflower began with a casual remark Kim Fraser made at home one evening: "You know what would be really cool? If I could print my own fabric."

She had no idea her husband, Stephen, heard her. Their three daughters had gone to bed, and she was just puttering with some craft projects.

"I thought it was one of those throw-away conversations -- that he wasn't even listening," Kim Fraser recalls.

But he was. And during the next few weeks, he continued to give it some thought. A lot of thought.

"There's no reason why someone like Kim couldn't print her own fabric," Stephen Fraser thought to himself.

An idea was percolating. And a few months later, he met his friend, Gart Davis, for coffee and a proposal. The men helped build Lulu.com, which offers print-on-demand books. There weren't yet any businesses specializing in print-on-demand fabric. Could this be a new venture for them?

Now, just one year later, the three of them are gathered in a former sock mill in Mebane, producing fabric designed by artists from around the globe. Their business, Spoonflower, has distributed more than 80,000 fabric designs worldwide, and about 50,000 people use their Web site. As of Saturday, designers can now choose to sell their designs on the Spoonflower Web site.

Their business, named after an endangered state wildflower, is starting to garner attention within the apparel industry. Spoonflower was recently mentioned in House Beautiful and Bust magazines. Apparel Magazine also gave it a 2009 Apparel All-Star Award, presented to companies that exhibit innovation, excellence in management, growth and corporate goodwill.

The Spoonflower office is sandwiched between a sign-printing business and a used-book store in downtown Mebane. It's an airy space with hardwood floors, high ceilings and large windows with views of the street. It's also near a locally owned coffee shop and a tapas restaurant with a martini bar -- "Everything an Internet start-up needs," Davis says, joking.

They use large-format printers, like ones usually used by the display industry to make signs. Four of these machines print designs, using water-based ink, onto 100-yard rolls of fabric. Thousands of images could be printed on a roll of cotton. Clients can order a swatch of fabric or 100 yards of a single design. The fabric is shipped within a week.

The Frasers and Davis work on laptop computers across from each other. All operations take place in one open room. Kim Fraser provides customer service and manages the company's blog, which announces upcoming specials and contests.

For "Fabric of the Week," artists can submit their designs, and people can vote online for their favorite. Stephen Fraser oversees the operations and marketing sides of the business, and Davis focuses on the engineering and financial areas. They both run the Web site and its operations. And, when necessary, they even load the printers, cut fabric and prepare orders for shipping. But before it came to all of this, the partners -- who knew nothing about sewing or textile design -- did their homework.

After that initial meeting over coffee, the men consulted their potential client base: the crafting community. Stephen Fraser created a Spoonflower Web page and posted a survey on it. He asked questions such as: How often do you engage in quilting, knitting, crocheting? Have you ever bought fabric online? Would you be interested in ordering custom-designed fabric printed with your own colors and patterns? If so, what fabric would you most want? And how much would you expect it to cost?

They also submitted a link to the survey on the Web site Sew Mama Sew, a blog targeting crafters. The survey generated about 500 responses, most of them overwhelmingly supportive of the concept. Many of those surveyed expressed the desire for such a service immediately.

Even with such positive feedback, the Spoonflower team started slowly. They created a blog and a waiting list, which grew to about 10,000 people by the end of the summer. They allowed small groups of subscribers to join at a time.

Stephen Fraser and Davis hired a software company to create a prototype for the Web site, then undertook a test run during the summer of 2009. They contracted to have the printing done at a local company serving the apparel industry. They cut fabric on the Frasers' kitchen table and mailed it at the local post office. The Frasers even shipped orders as they traveled on their family vacation.

On his family vacation at the Chesapeake Bay in 2008, Davis walked along the waterfront. He thought about Spoonflower and all of its possibilities.

"There's nothing I'd rather be doing," he thought to himself.

Fast forward to this summer. Davis returned to the Chesapeake Bay with his family. He looked toward the horizon and thought about Spoonflower. Was he creating an institution that empowers people? Was he engaged in something that allowed people to express themselves creatively and positively? After some reflection, he came to this conclusion: "There's nothing I'd rather be doing."

Neither Davis nor Stephen Fraser know how to sew.

But here's the thing. This isn't just a business venture for them. The more they learn about textile design, the more they respect it. They get satisfaction from knowing their business gives people a creative outlet. Subscribers include graphic designers whose jobs are creative, as well as attorneys who use Spoonflower as their creative outlet. Some clients are like Amy Gates, creative moms who enjoy making their own holiday or birthday gifts.

But Gates has more textile design experience than most casual crafters. A graduate of the Rhode Island School of Design, Gates started a design business after she graduated in 1980. Gates and her sister handpainted designs on fabric for other designers. At that time, it was a complicated, time-consuming process. They had to treat, paint and dry the fabric. They also inhaled toxic dyes, and if they ran out of paint, they mixed colors repeatedly to get the exact shade they needed. It took at least a week to produce 16 to 20 yards of fabric, something that can be printed within three to four hours at Spoonflower.

"It was wonderful, but it was really hard to make it profitable because it took so much labor, you couldn't charge what it was worth," Gates says.

The beauty of Spoonflower is that replicating a pattern is much easier, Gates says.

Stephen Fraser explains the step-by-step process on a video posted on the Spoonflower Web site. Once users register, they upload their designs on the Spoonflower Web site. They can select the type of fabric, the layout for their design and the amount of fabric they want. They also can see what their pattern will look like on a swatch of fabric before it's printed. Once the staff receives the design, it's printed much like a document from your computer to your printer.

Gates doubts she'll delve into textile design again. The Greensboro mom and yoga teacher mostly gets creative around the holidays. But she still has a lot of her old fabric designs, and she may one day use Spoonflower to print more.

Although Gates doesn't pursue crafting like she once did, others are turning it into serious hobbies and side businesses. Many of the people using Spoonflower sell their crafts on Etsy, an online market where crafters can sell handmade items.

This resurgence in crafting is evident around the world. Sales of sewing machines skyrocketed 500 percent in the United Kingdom, according to an article published this year on the U.K.'s Daily Mail Web site. The article cited the recession as one reason that people are turning to making things themselves.

For Kim Fraser, it's also about the joy of creating something unique. Fraser, a baker by trade, started sewing in college. She sews clothes for her daughters and items for their home.

She's drawn to hobbies once considered basic housewifely duties: sewing, gardening and cooking. But now, homemaking is elevated to an art form, Kim Fraser says. Innumerable cooking and food blogs can be found online. Entire blogs are dedicated to how people have decorated the rooms in their homes.

"I think people in general want a creative outlet," Stephen Fraser says.

And that's where Spoonflower comes in. The company's clients use customized fabric to make children's clothes, curtains, quilts, dolls or even coin purses.

"Fabric is beautiful in that it's appealing," Stephen Fraser says. "Part of it is color, part of it is texture, and part of it is design."

And this foray into textiles also raised their awareness about the region's rich textile history, particularly in Alamance County. They see it as their way of bringing textiles back to Alamance County -- 21st-century-style.

Contact Tina Firesheets at 373-3498 or tina.firesheets@news-record.com