Our wildlife art print of this rare and beautiful native lizard is so animated it looks likes it’s going to scamper right off the shirt! In this case a crew neck, mid-weight (185gsm) women’s t-shirt.
New Zealand is ground zero for geckos, with more native lizards found on these islands from north to south than in any other temperate place in the world, they thrive in forests, dunes, grasslands, rocky alpine areas, even under the odd stack of corrugated iron roofing. The Jewelled gecko is a species found only on the South Island of New Zealand, particularly the southeastern regions of Canterbury and Otago from Banks Peninsula southwards.
This design pairs best with white, kelly green, forest green, and black for maximum contrast.
Level up your black t-shirt with our vivid jewelled gecko print. The intricate details are printed directly onto the fabric, while the black in the print is knocked-out, this allows the colours of the print to pop more against black of the shirt.
The Jewelled Gecko design is available from our online stores, our local store that supplies our New Brighton Seaside Market stall, Saturdays 10 a.m.–2 p.m., and from our two retail outlets in New Brighton Mall; Brighton Gallery and The Creatives Edit.
Shop Across our Stores
Shop for the Jewelled Gecko design across our Surface Active stores:
- by ordering here to have it locally printed and DTF heat pressed right here in New Brighton.
- T-Shirt Price: $48 plus shipping via Courier Post. Shipping starts at $8 (varies by quantity).
- Longsleeve T-shirt Price: $58 plus shipping.
- International customers will be charged the actual shipping cost based on the weight and the destination of their order.
- As a guide a Large Surface Active 185 gsm t-shirt weighs 130–150 grams.
Or you can shop at either:
- our NZ based or
- our international DTG printing partner e-stores.
- (Use code: “PERFEC” for 5% off your international store purchase.)
The Design Inspiration: Great New Zealand Wildlife Photography
The inspiration for the design came from superlative wildlife photographer Rod Morris. Chrissie and visited Rod’s image library in Dunedin back in the 90s to find slides that he had cherry-picked as having the potential to be developed into hand-separated wildlife art for screenprinting.
The Art of Reduction: Hand Separating Colours Involved Creating Eight Stencils, Each Representing a Single Colour Used in the Final Screen Print
- Keen Eyes, Steady Hands: I relied on meticulous handwork to identify and isolate specific colour hues, and tones of shadow and light in the reference photograph.
- Layering the Art: As each separate stencil would be used to create a single-colour layer on the final print, I used translucent mylar architectural drafting film to help me build up the image one colour at a time, on a lightbox and drawing board.
- Registration Finesse: I employed mechanical punched registration of the sort used in old-school cel animation to ensure the isolated specific colour stencils aligned perfectly, allowing me to trace, draw and paint the simplified colour image onto each of the eight stencils, and check the alignment of each separation for alignment to the black stippled pen and ink drawing.
- Rubylith’s Reign: Rubylith, a translucent red film that blocked process camera’s lights, was used to quickly create solid colour areas of stencils.
- A Printer’s Palette: The final number of stencils used depended on the desired colour complexity, with this print requiring nine separations, including one that was split between two colours.
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