Print Labs
Multi-day block printing, indigo and natural dye courses in Berlin
Three- to five-day set programmes in print, colour and resist, for up to four people or booked privately.
Seasonal research programmes shaped by the work happening inside the atelier.
Each Lab is developed from the atelier's ongoing research and explores a set focus in natural colour, print, indigo or resist. Unlike a Research Intensive, the programme is already designed. The Summer Print Lab runs each August, and any Lab can be booked privately year-round.
What is a Print Lab
A Print Lab is a print research programme at Atelier Māya, a textile research studio and print lab in Berlin.
Each Lab is built around a particular group of print and colour processes. Depending on the techniques being explored, a programme runs for three, four or five days. Places are usually limited to four participants.
Print Labs are developed from research already taking place inside the studio. You work surrounded by more than a decade of material investigation. Printed samples, dye tests, carved blocks, pigments and natural colour studies can be pulled out, compared and used as starting points.
You are not coming to the atelier simply to be shown a process. You are coming to work inside an existing body of textile research and use it as a starting point for your own.
How a Print Lab differs from a workshop
A workshop introduces a process in a day or two.
A Print Lab is built around a process or a selection of complementary processes. The programme gives each process the time it actually needs, including resting, curing, drying, oxidation, repeated immersion and the slow building of colour. Nothing is compressed to fit a shorter format or to give quick results. It is an immersive and research-focused textile experience.
Current research at the atelier shapes the programme. The results are always experimental.
Practitioners who attend begin with the same process and have access to the same materials. With the choices of materials available, each creative journey will be different. There is enough time and materials to explore questions, experiment, make mistakes and learn. You get to explore colour, repetition, and make your own material choices along the way.
How a Print Lab differs from a Research Intensive
A Research Intensive is shaped around the practitioner and their practice.
A Print Lab is already designed. Participants enter an existing research programme.
Both take place in the same working atelier. The difference is who the programme is built around.
If you have a specific question or project of your own, a Research Intensive is the better fit. If you would like to step into a designed programme, choose a Print Lab.
Slow Practice
Slow Practice is built into every research experience at the atelier.
In a Print Lab, you handle the tools, materials and processes yourself. There is time to test, make mistakes, iterate and make the decisions through which technical knowledge becomes your own.
You don't learn textile processes simply by watching them done correctly. A knowledge gap exists between being shown something and being able to do it unaccompanied.
Slow Practice is where our research inspires your own.
Areas of research that inspire the print labs
Our Print Labs grow out of ongoing research at Atelier Māya. Each programme brings together a selected group of complementary processes that can stand alone or be combined.
Print Thinking
Using print as a way of thinking through pattern, rhythm and material.
Botanical + Natural Colour
Building colour from plant, mineral and other natural sources through layered processes.
Mordant Printing
Using mordants to build colour directly through the print process.
Wax + Resist
Exploring how resist shapes colour, surface and the movement of dye through cloth.
Surface Design
Building cloth through print, repetition, layering and mark making.
Block Printing + Repeat
Exploring repetition, placement and variation with hand-carved blocks.
Paste Making
Developing print and resist pastes as part of the material research itself.
Indigo Dyeing
Working slowly with the vat, repeated immersion and the gradual building of blue.
Responsible Colour
Looking at colour through material choice, process, sourcing and impact.
Cloth Preparation
Understanding how preparation changes the way cloth receives colour, print and resist.
These labs are part of our exploratory atelier practice; we test, adjust, and let the material lead the next step.
Some Labs move across several of these fields. Others stay with one relationship for several days. The aim is not simply to reproduce a technique. It is to understand what a process can do and how it might become part of your own practice.
The rhythm of a Lab
A Lab moves over days from surface to colour to resist, and closes with finishing.
Work made early in the programme rests, cures or dries while the next process begins, and returns later in the week to be dyed, layered or finished. Several pieces are in different stages at any moment.
This is why the programmes run over days. Slow Practice at Atelier Māya is all about taking the time to discover your own visual language in the process and colours you are drawn to.
Length and group size
Print Labs run for three to five days and can accommodate one to four participants.
The length depends on the processes involved. A tightly connected group of printing and colour techniques can be explored in three days. Indigo, resist, and layered colour need longer.
Four people allow close technical guidance while keeping the atmosphere of a working atelier rather than a classroom.
Who a Print Lab is for
Artists, designers, textile practitioners, educators, researchers and material-led makers.
Both emerging and established practitioners are welcome. What matters is an interest in cloth, colour and process rather than previous printing experience.
Each edition states the level it is pitched at when dates are released.
When do Print Labs run
The Summer Print Lab takes place at the end of August each year. The next edition runs at the end of August 2027.
Further Labs are released at selected points in the year, moving through different areas of the atelier’s practice, from print and natural colour to more concentrated studies of indigo, resist and the slow construction of colour on cloth.
Each edition has its own research focus, programme length, techniques, dates, materials and participation fee.
Private Print Labs at Atelier Māya
You can book a Print Lab privately, on your own or with a small group.
The programme stays the same. You choose the dates, and the atelier is yours alone for the length of the Lab. This works well for practitioners travelling to Berlin on fixed dates. We can accommodate two or three people booking together, and anyone who would rather begin without a group.
Private Print Labs suit beginners. The set programme follows the first process, with guidance adjusted to the pace of the people in the room.
Private bookings can be arranged year-round and are quoted on request.
Practical information
Fees
Because every Print Lab at Atelier Māya is developed around a particular programme, fees depend on the format, programme length, and any specialist materials or custom blocks involved.
We send the programme details and fee together when each Lab is released.
Language
Print Labs are held in English.
Booking
Print Labs and all creative experiences are scheduled around the atelier’s ongoing research and production calendar. We plan longer programmes well ahead of time.
Location
All Print Labs take place at Atelier Māya in Berlin, Germany. Travel and accommodation are arranged independently.
Materials
Standard research materials and access to the atelier’s working textile library are included.
Specialist fabrics, unusually large quantities, custom blocks and other project-specific materials are discussed and arranged in advance and may be charged separately.
Photography + confidentiality
Atelier Māya is a private working studio. Photography and filming inside the atelier are by agreement, with details set out as part of the booking process.
Enquire
Write to the atelier to register interest in the next Summer Print Lab, to ask about a private Print Lab, or to ask anything about the programmes.
Enquiries are answered personally. We send dates, programme details, and participation fees for the next public edition to everyone who has been in touch before we publish the Lab.
Enquire about Print Labs - design (at) ateliermaya.eu
