In this tutorial, we will create a custom pattern brush in Illustrator, which we will use to created a border for a circular tag. This tag will eventually become an SVG print and cut design.

The first step in creating a custom brush in Illustrator is to draw the path for the shape. For our border, I drew a simple curved shape path with the default black l pt. stroke. Next, I switch the stroke to a fill, which set the stroke to null.

Now to make this into a Pattern Brush in Illustrator^R, which will result in the artwork being placed at regular intervals long a path.

1. With the filled object selected, click New Brush from the Brush Panel Menu.
   
   
2. Set the brush type to Pattern Brush in the New Brush dialog box.
   
   
3. In the Brush Options dialog box set the following options.
   
   Name: Give your new brush a name.
   
   Scale: As we have drawn the brush shape to the size we wish to use, we will keep this at 0%.
   
   Fit - Set this to Approximate path.
   
   Colorization: We want to be able to set the color for the brush, so let's use the Tints option. With this option, the color of the brush will be obtained from the color currently set for the Stroke.
   
   You will see your new brush added to the Brushes panel. Now we can create a circular border with our new brush.
   
   
4. Click on the artboard with the Ellipse tool and set the width and height to 2 inches.
   
   
5. With the Fill set to null and the Stroke set to the color we need, click on your new brush in the Brushes panel. The brush artwork will be placed around the circular path.
   
   
6. Save this as an Illustrator file.
   
   Now we will go to Photoshop^R to finish the tag design.
   
   
7. With the circle selected, click Edit - Copy to transfer it to Photoshop.
   
   
8. In Photoshop, start a new document that is 2 inches x 2 inches x 300 dpi. Paste the new border into the document.
   
   

Now that we have our border, which we can duplicate for each tag, we just need to create the artwork that will go in the center of our tag.

Images of finished designs made with Canvas Corp Brands products used by permission.
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