Design Your Own Clothing – How To Design Clothes

So you are here because you want to know how to design clothes. Great! It is our pleasure to help you with your journey to design your own clothing professionally. First you want to think about what type of design you want to design. Is the design you want to create something totally new? Is your design idea a twist on a current trend? Is the design you want to create a throwback from the past? During this phase your creativity and inspiration will lead you to have your initial thoughts on logo placement, artwork and fabric choice. Once you decide what type of design you want to create you can move to the next phase which is illustrating your fashion design. Here are 4 steps to designing your own apparel.

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How to Design Your Own Clothing – Step 1

Decide whether you want to hand sketch your design or do you want to use a fashion design software app. Most industry fashion designer use clothing design software or graphic design software to create their fashion sketches. There are many reasons and benefits to using a software to design your clothing over other methods. One of the most important reasons to use digital design sketches is that apparel manufacturers 100% prefer and many require them. Plus digital sketches created with fashion software are easy to understand and look more professional. Hand sketches are mostly use for initial inspiration or to display the designer’s artistic viewpoint. Digital designs are easier to manipulate and create different versions from. With digital designs you can swap colors and fabrics into the design with ease. This feat would be hard to accomplish with hand sketches unless you feel like drawing the same design over and over. If you are not great at hand drawing then you could enroll in a class to teach you. You could also go to school for fashion drawing. You could also use a software like Digital Fashion Pro where it does not matter if you can draw or not.

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Designing Your Own Clothes – Step 2

Step 2 to designing your own clothes is finalizing your design. After you have created different versions or colorways of your design you can then design which design(s) you want to get made. There is a cost to getting samples made of your apparel styles so you will want to go with your strongest designs. You may want to get a consensus as to which styles you should go with before moving to the sampling phase. Getting opinions from others will not only help you save money but it will also give you an idea of which of your styles are the most marketable. Ultimately you want to create styles that you know will sell. Whether you are designing your own leggings, t-shirts, jeans, hoodies, shirts, dresses, jackets, swimwear, socks, shoes etc. you want to make sure your design stands out and has the it factor.

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How to Design Clothes – Step 3

The third step to how to design clothes before moving to sampling is manufacturing / sampling preparation. This is the stage that separates the beginners without knowledge and the beginners who have sought out resources that can help in the process. Let us explain. Many new designers think that by just giving a clothing manufacturer, seamstress or sample maker your fashion sketch is enough for them to make the design. Professional fashion designers know that in order to have a design made a tech pack is needed. A tech pack consist of garment sketch, technical sketch, spec sheet with the garment’s measurements, grading and other design details like fabric choice. Beginners can get great help with all these details with the Line Start Clothing Line Start-Up Kit from Digital Fashion Pro.

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Designing Your Own Clothing / Getting Your Designs Made – Step 4

The next step to designing your own clothing is getting your styles made. There are many options for getting your clothing made. You can go with an apparel manufacturer that prints your design on existing blanks. You can also have a manufacturer, seamstress or sample maker make your designs from scratch. There are pros and cons to each method. Putting your design or logo on existing clothing can be cost effective but this method additionally has certain limitations. You often do not have the choice to customize fabric options, sizing or custom color choices. Manufacturing from scratch can have limitations as well which may be based on your budget and quantity ordered. Most established clothing companies manufacturer from scratch because it allows the greatest flexibility, customization, precision and branding. For more info you can also see our post on How to Start a Clothing Line.

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