Story and photo by Emily Leadem
When University of Oregon sophomore Ginger Blackwell started designing clothes from a simple doodle in her notebook, she had no idea how popular her GingyCake Designs clothing line would be. Her once simple idea of selling screen-printed shirts on a smaller scale to family and friends soon expanded far beyond what she imagined to an international scale.
An Ashland, Oregon native, Blackwell came up with the idea to make sweatshirts and t-shirts before she enrolled at the University of Oregon. A fan of indie music and an adventurer that has traveled to several exotic locations around the world, including China and Costa Rica, Blackwell’s free spirited and lively nature influence her design artwork and reflects her vision for GingyCake Designs.
One of the most iconic and popular designs of the brand is the panda pocket t-shirt. This design consists of a panda doodle peeking out of a printed pocket on the front of each clothing piece.
The panda pocket design was born through her original reservation about drawing an entire panda body, explains Blackwell. As a solution, she chose to avoid the issue of the panda body altogether and instead drew a pocket to have the panda poking out of the top.
She made her first silkscreen while still in high school and began printing on all types of clothing after that. The original design was the iconic panda in a pocket, printed on t-shirts in a simple yet recognizable way. Soon after the panda design became successful, Blackwell decided to sell her clothing designs online.
“I made a silkscreen in high school and I wanted to see if anyone would want to buy it,” Blackwell recalls, adding that her first listing was on popular arts and crafts online retailer Etsy. “Two hours later, I got my first purchase.”
The Art of Design
According to Blackwell, the process of designing and making of the clothing items requires several steps.
“I draw all the images by hand and I get a silkscreen made,” says Blackwell, explaining the process. “Then, I print them by hand and usually you have somebody else hold it down, but since I do it by myself I use my knee to hold it down.”
Blackwell prints her designs on a variety of clothing items, including t-shirts, sweatshirts, and tank tops. Beyond the panda pocket design, Blackwell has also recently added other doodle designs to the GingyCake collection. As member of the Gamma Phi Beta sorority, she has used her background within Greek Life to create custom designs for specific houses, such as a crescent moon panda design for Gamma Phi Beta and an owl pocket t-shirt for Chi Omega.
“I think that there is a big market in sororities,” says Blackwell, explaining her decision to expand into this market. “So I incorporated their symbols and mascots, like the owl for Chi Omega and the panda for Alpha Omega Pi.” She has a dinosaur and squirrel design mixed in as well.
In total, Blackwell has produced approximately 350 GingyCake clothing items and counting. Blackwell has already sold her clothes both within the United States as well as internationally, with Germany, Australia, the United Kingdom, and Singapore all home to past customers.
In the future, Blackwell envisions expanding her business further internationally and wants to put the GingyCake name on the map around the world. Her main goal is to find additional outlets for her designs outside of clothing specifically and broaden her consumer reach.
“I want to go beyond t-shirts and do some stickers and decals, and hopefully get trademarks and copyrights on some of my images,” she says. “I want to have more designs and keep growing.”
