The most simplest answer: it is the designs (patterns) one sees on just about every product imaginable. Think of fabrics, wrapping paper, or wallpaper, home decor, and anything with a pattern on it. Those patterns were created by someone either digitally or hand-drawn.
A few years back while decorating my home office and trying to find a fabric for window treatments I stumbled upon a website for surface pattern designs. It was one of those "Ah ha!" moments for me.
My graphic design job at a major university was designing ads, brochures, programs, and web graphics. It was fun, however, creating my own designs to use on fabrics and wrapping paper was so much more exciting. I immediately signed up for an online class. That's all it took.
Draw/Sketch by hand. Upload to Illustrator or Photoshop. Manipulate and clean up the design. Add color. Create a repeating pattern (a pattern that continuously prints without losing the pattern). Upload the pattern to an online printer to print on fabric, wallpaper, or wrapping paper.
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The photos above show the process I took from sketch to bed linens using my Florida Wildflowers designs! The feature image is an infinity scarf I sewed using two options of the fabric.
Quickly moved from designing wrapping paper to designing patterns for fabrics. My hobby has now become my business. I enjoy sewing so I put the two processes together, and here you have it. Custom designed surface patterns from original artwork sewn into pretty, fun little travel jewelry pouches.