It seems worth pursuing and I want to work with students full time - without the drain that administrative work can represent. My goals for my cloth are fairly straightforward. And I look for the same qualities in other's work, whether it is the work of my students or the work of another artist who shares my passion for cloth. The hand is the quality of the fabric related to how it feels and how it drapes. I don't ever want to put a medium on my fabric that will change the hand by making it stiff or hard.
Some fabrics are thicker, so the hand is stiffer to start.
The subtleties of printing various media on different fabric types is something we learn as we go along - studying the effects of paints and dyes on silks, cottons, rayons and linens. The patterning on the fabric should also catch the viewer's eye and hold her attention. Cloth may be patterned simply or may have many layers of imagery. Both approaches are valid. Other artists choose to use recognizable imagery of one style or another.