If you ever read sewing blogs or follow sewers on social media, you may have heard them talking about pattern hacking, and maybe you wondered what that is or how you do it?
Basically a pattern hack is making a change to a printed pattern.
It may be as simple as mixing and matching pattern pieces between versions of the same pattern. Maybe your pattern has view A with a round neck and short sleeves and view B with a v-neck and long sleeves. You want your dress to have a round neck with long sleeves. You simply use the bodice pattern for view A (round neck) with the sleeve pattern for view B (long sleeves.) Pattern pieces within one pattern are usually interchangeable.
Once you are a bit more confident, it’s fairly easy, and very satisfying, to make bigger changes and you can reach the stage where you don’t need to keep buying patterns. Just use what you have and mix and match or make alterations to suit your needs.
One of my ‘go to’ patterns is from a Prima magazine from 1992. I’ve used it several times in a variety of ways, including moving the opening from the front to the back. This can make a huge difference to the look of a pattern – and add a different style of skirt and no-one would know that today’s dress was made from the same pattern as yesterday’s!
Bodice patterns are usually only half of the bodice and you either cut on the fold for one piece or cut two pieces for the opening. To make this dress, which has a front opening, as a back opening dress, I cut the front in one piece by placing it on the fold. The pattern has a seam allowance on the centre front, for the facing. You don’t need this facing if you don’t want buttons down the front, so put the centre front 5/8″ (or whatever the seam allowance on the pattern is) beyond the fold. You now need an opening for the back, so you need seam allowances here. So when you cut out the back piece, cut 5/8″ extra on the width, at the centre back.
Adding pockets can be another simple alteration to a basic pattern, and you can make all sorts of fancy patch pockets if you use those.
Another step further is sometimes referred to as a pattern mashup. This is when you use elements from more than one pattern.
This blouse is made from three different patterns – one for the bodice, one for the collar and one for the sleeves. It’s a good idea to have made garments in a similar style before you start making major adjustments, so that you know how to put them together. The button band and collar on this blouse were a bit of a challenge!
I haven’t quite finished this yet, but I will be posting it on my Instagram page when it’s finished, so you can see it there, and read a bit more about its construction.
I’ve made a number of blouses from dress patterns. The main thing to watch here is the length of the bodice. If the pattern is designed to attach to a skirt at the waist, you will need to add extra to allow your blouse to tuck into a skirt or trousers. The simplest way is to measure it against a blouse you already have which is the correct length.
It’s usually fairly simple to add a skirt from one pattern to a bodice from another. The main thing is to make sure openings align and that the waist seams are the same length – your skirt waist should match the bottom of the bodice.
It’s very satisfying mixing up your patterns like this, saves money and means that your hand made clothes are even more likely to be unique! What’s not to like?
I’d love to hear about your pattern-hacking adventures, either here, on Instagram or on Facebook.
