E-book for Pattern Cutting

[friquant]

I'm reading a book on pattern cutting.

Making a pattern generally seems like a challenging task for me. Even a simple cylinder-shaped duffel, matching the diameter of the end pieces to the right size rectangle to go around the circumference, measuring and math don't usually get me there. I usually have to actually assemble the pieces and then find out that the circle needs to be a little larger, or smaller. I don't know if the discrepancy is in my intended vs actual seam allowance, or in some amount of stretch I'm putting on the material as I guide it through the machine, too many years since math class, or a mystical lesson in humility. But I keep trying..

When I look for "how to create a pattern for bags" online, I find only patterns for bags. When I look for "pattern making", I mostly find how to make patterns for women's clothes. (I did make a fitted apron for my girlfriend last year, vinyl through the bust area, and it did get worn a few times.) And most of the resources I find are video, and they take a looong time to get to the point. And at some point they want you to pay to watch more videos.

A couple of days ago, searching yet again for how to make patterns and running into all the challenges of the previous paragraph, I found an E-book for $6 on pattern making for men's clothes. Not as cool as if it were for making day packs, but I couldn't find that so here is this.

Pattern Cutting for Menswear (Gareth Kershaw)
Amazon link: https://www.amazon.com/dp/1786276755

 

My favorite page so far I have dubbed "Why Supermarket Clothing is Square". Here is the text from that page:

CLOTHING FIT AND BODY ASSESSMENT
A well-fitted garment is something that is comfortable to wear and improves your appearance, and it should hang without wrinkles and contour the body.

Fitting as a taught technique has been in decline in recent years as society becomes increasingly informal and casual clothing made from stretch fabrics dominates people’s wardrobes, eliminating the need to contour garments to the individual body.

Although apparel categories have different fitting requirements — high street, sportswear or formal wear — these can easily be addressed through the inclusion or reduction of wearing ease. What cannot be predetermined is your customer’s body shape, height and proportions.

Figure analysis and fitting are techniques that can help you to address these anomalies throughout your collection. Fashion advertising generally promotes archetypal images of the male figure: slim, tall, muscular or symmetrically proportioned. This is only a small percentage of your market.

Commercially produced clothing is predominantly developed on a mannequin (see here), which has a perfect upright posture, unlike 75% of your potential customers. Most common fitting issues occur due to the lack of shaping in garments, as squarer silhouettes are used in casual clothing to capture a broad range of body types.

Unlike most tailoring, which is individually shaped to a customer's physique, commercially bought patterns do not accommodate any irregularities in the human,form that deviate from the erect vertical stance generally promoted on the catwalk.

The other cool piece that the author has made clear is that the size charts used to make the same item in multiple sizes, are based on about ten measurements, and those measurements march linearly from one size to the next. You can see this on this photo of a Simplicity pattern we pulled out of a drawer. The difference from size 12 to size 14 on this pattern is the same as the difference from size 14 to size 16.

(I pulled the pattern out when the book started talking about annotations so I could see actual examples.)

Reading the book through the kindle web viewer is not as convenient as thumbing through a paper book. But the price was right, and it was available immediately. Enjoying the content so far.

[chuck123wapati]

very cool find!! I have a Buckaroo Bobbins vest pattern packet I bought over a year ago. Every instruction and size for leather or fabric is printed on it, somewhere, but it's confusing for sure. I almost had the pockets figured out once, lol, they beat me into submission.

I bought it because I figured a vest would be easiest to learn.

Old unopened patterns can be found at thrift stores for pennies, usually, men's stuff is rare though.

[kgg]

1 hour ago, friquant said:

I'm reading a book on pattern cutting.

Interesting topic as I completed a 12 oz duck canvas work vest with 580 gsm lining a couple of days ago. I was going to purchase one but for the sake of a time, couple of running yards of material, zipper, rib cuff, thread and a few fancy works of encouragement it cost me about $50 CAD. Equipment used consisted of a full length mirror, cardboard, chalk and "Little Baby" a Juki DU-1181N (flatbed walking foot). 

 

Edited Saturday at 07:07 PM by kgg

[friquant]

5 hours ago, kgg said:

I completed a 12 oz duck canvas work vest with 580 gsm lining a couple of days ago.

Looks sturdy (on the outside) and soft (on the inside)! What did you use for a design concept? Which body measurements did you use? Did you make any mock ups before the final product?

I found this blog entry today on "What is pattern cutting": https://www.clothingmanufacturersuk.com/post/what-is-pattern-cutting

That article describes it as taking an artist's design sketch and turning it into a working, reliable pattern. I had not thought of "pattern cutting" as being distinct from the design process. My mental model was more like "design and build an object, and make a pattern along the way so you can replicate it." I would like to try sketching something (like a 3-D perspective view that normal people would recognize) and then see if I can cut a pattern to build what I sketched. Pardon me while I take six months off to improve my drawing skills. 😀

[kgg]

1 hour ago, friquant said:

What did you use for a design concept?

A a design guide I used something similar to the Tough Duck work vest that has a quilted lining

i) I changed the throat line so when I don't have it fully zippered both side folds to the sides so the top edge doesn't catch you in the throat,

ii) changed the exterior pocket size so it had rounded pocket opening corners

iii) increased the pocket opening by about inch or so wider 

iv) added a interior pocket that was sewn to the 12 oz exterior rather then to the lining

v) Both the interior pocket and the exterior pocket extends to the bottom hem

vi) All edges (arm pits, bottom hem, zipper line) had 1" nylon bias binding installed with a 1" raw edge folder/binder with a swing-away attachment

vii) The back butt flap had 1 1/2" polyester flat bias added to stop the interior lining from being pulled down into the butt flap. I definitively could have done a better job of aligning the exterior bias with the interior which shows on my interior seam. 

viii) The interior and exterior seams at the shoulder and under the armpits were reinforced 1" nylon bias.

ix) added a 1" stainless steel hangup ring to the exterior back and one to the left pocket to hook my keys on.

1 hour ago, friquant said:

Which body measurements did you use?

Shoulder to collar bone and armpit to bottom of pants belt.

1 hour ago, friquant said:

Did you make any mock ups before the final product?

Made my cardboard templates then rough cut the three panels (back and two front panels) leaving a lot of extra material all around. The reason for that was duck canvas shrinks a lot, up to 10 percent, when washed and dried in the dryer. As a note I lost nearly 6 inches on a 63" wide bolt duck canvas. The benefit is that the density increases to that of about 13 oz duck canvas. I would have been royally peeved if I had cut and sewn together only to find it would be a lot smaller after washing / drying. The lining was also rough cut and washed / dried but the shrinkage might have been only a couple percent. 

After cutting and sewing the 570 gsm lining to the individual panels I used clips to hold all pieces together then stood in front of the full length mirror to made some adjustments. As a note most work vests with nylon quilted linings are about 120 gsm.

Then let the Juki DU-1181N ("Little Baby") do her magic.

If I had to do it again I would change a couple things but for a work vest it's functional, warm and inexpensive.

kgg

Edited Sunday at 02:53 AM by kgg

[chuck123wapati]

15 hours ago, kgg said:

Interesting topic as I completed a 12 oz duck canvas work vest with 580 gsm lining a couple of days ago. I was going to purchase one but for the sake of a time, couple of running yards of material, zipper, rib cuff, thread and a few fancy works of encouragement it cost me about $50 CAD. Equipment used consisted of a full length mirror, cardboard, chalk and "Little Baby" a Juki DU-1181N (flatbed walking foot). 

 

Dang, it can be done by mere mortals lol. Thats a nice vest!!!!

[kgg]

3 hours ago, chuck123wapati said:

Thats a nice vest!!!!

Thank you.

kgg

[dikman]

On 3/8/2026 at 4:23 AM, chuck123wapati said:

 I almost had the pockets figured out once, lol, they beat me into submission.

 Me too! I bought a set of patterns for making several different vest styles, made thick paper patterns and went as far as cutting the pieces out of some old curtain liners that I use for experimenting with. That's as far as I got, making the pockets work did my head in!!

Yep, very nice job kgg.

[kgg]

32 minutes ago, dikman said:

Yep, very nice job kgg.

Thank you.

kgg

[Digit]

On 3/7/2026 at 6:20 PM, friquant said:

I don't know if the discrepancy is in my intended vs actual seam allowance, or in some amount of stretch I'm putting on the material as I guide it through the machine

Personally I've so far always calculated radii and circumferences for making bags with rounded corners and they always matched up. The important thing (as I see it) is to line up everything correctly by marking specific locations (first on the pattern, then on the leather) and using CA to put the parts together so that they can't stretch/shift while stitching. Since the CA is only for temporary setting, you can use a weaker, water-based CA.
For a cylinder-shaped bag with a bottom seam I'd mark the center of the square (top of the bag) and the two quarters, the bottom seam is your fourth mark; on the gussets I'd place a mark every 90°. When assembling, start with some CA an inch around the markings, place together and add a clip; do this for each of the four marks; then do the same for each remaining quarter circle. When you're happy with the glued fit, stitch it to complete, otherwise take it apart and start over.

As for creating clothes patterns: I've only yet made one item for myself, so I created a pattern on my own body. I started with some wallpaper (cheap surplus lots from a thrift store) that I stapled together (with outside 'seams' for stapler access). Then I made a cardboard pattern with added seam allowance. Then I cut everything from textile (I had some surplus stuff lying around; when that's finished I'll probably move on to old bed sheets or something) and stitched it together on a household machine. Fitted again and adjusted the pattern accordingly and created a new pattern. A set of French curves helped me a lot. You can see the result in the NSFW section.
When I ever have to make a similar item for someone else, I now know which measurements matter and I'll probably be able to create a new pattern from the old one with the new measurements.

Another way of creating a one-off pattern for a fitting, custom-sized clothes item is to create a tape dummy, something I've heard fursuit creators ask for: let the customer don a disposable dust/paint coverall and have an assistant tape it (using non-stretchy tape such as masking tape or duct tape), cut off the suit and send it to the maker. They now have a base they can use to create a pattern from.

When designing a new bag the patterning process is similar: start with an idea, make some sketches, make a mockup out of sturdy, stapled-together paper (such as wallpaper), make a first pattern, assemble something from a cheap material (eg felt) and see how it would fit together, noting the order of assembly and feasibility of (machine) stitching it. Adjust where needed and create a final pattern.
Making a mockup of a bag also gives insights into its final size and proportions, which is difficult to imagine when just sketching or patterning.

And finally thank you for the link to the patterning book. It may be useful to have some formal guides to making clothes patterns in the future.