Explore Your Creativity when You Design Clothes for Yourself 

Expensive Looking Clothing You Designed Yourself - What a Feeling!

Take a quick look at what it takes to become a fashion designer. Yes, you could be out of the ordinary loop and making your own clothing right now. Here are a few tips to get you started.

Fashion trends change with every season and most women cannot afford to buy a whole new wardrobe that often, much as they'd like to be able to do so.

Other women may not care for the styles currently available, leaving them to opt for retro or vintage clothing. Some will simply stick with the wardrobe they already have. Then there are some creative sorts who decide to sew their own clothes from patterns they devise for a truly unique look.

What's Your Deep Desire?

If you have an urge to design clothes, you should give it a shot. Even if you don't know how to sew, it's easy enough to sign up for a sewing class. Learning how to design clothes can prove a satisfying hobby and will save you a bundle of money.

Beginner Clothing Designs

If you're a beginner, it's best to work from an existing pattern. Classic styles are easiest to modify, as the lines are simple. Find a pattern for whatever garment you'd like to design. A dress or skirt is a good choice. Pants and blouses can prove difficult to fit or modify. There is another way to get started in designing clothing. And that is to enroll in ...

Fashion Design Courses

Some people seem to be born with an innate talent for fashion, that intuitive ability to put together imaginative combinations of colors, textures and accessories in stunning costumes that others of us, less fortunate, might never have imagined.

Perhaps one of the most famous fashion designers of all time, Coco Chanel, had this to say about fashion: "Fashion is not something that exists in dresses only. Fashion is in the sky, in the street, fashion has to do with ideas, the way we live, what is happening."

Her passion for fashion design represents that innovative, yet classic timelessness that some of us can only dream of … yet, if you are one of those lucky individuals, pursue your dreams! Fashion design courses are a good starting point for the aspiring fashion designer, providing a way for you to test the waters and see if fashion isn't your dream career.

Options for Careers in Fashion Design

There are a number of fascinating career paths you might follow, including fashion design, textile design and niches within the industry, such as becoming a fashion journalist or a specialist in 'green' design, fashion store design or fashion accessories.

Other fashion niche careers you might find a fascinating career path include menswear, bridal gowns, knitwear and active sportswear. Many a young designer has made a big splash in the fashion world with these specialty creations. You might also opt for the marketing and merchandising aspects of the fashion industry.

To whet your appetite, try attending a few fashion school graduate shows to see the creations of the best and brightest new designers. You'll surely be inspired to see how your own sketches measure up.

Your next step might be to get online and survey the many fashion design schools and their curriculum. Look at their credentials, in terms of the staff they employ, the fashion houses their grads have been hired in to and the scope of fashion design courses offered by the school.

You may be surprised to learn that there are fashion design schools which offer fashion design courses to aspiring designers not yet out of high school.

This attractive option allows you to explore the variety of careers available within the fashion industry, without spending a fortune on a year's tuition. For example, if your fashion passion is textiles, you can sign up for fashion design courses which focus specifically on that area of the industry. Learn how to design textiles, knitwear, 'green' wear, or take a course in fiber technology.

Tips for Making Your Own Clothes

Working from the picture on the pattern envelope, get a sketch pad and pencil and lightly sketch the clothes item as pictured. This is the starting point for your own clothes design. Now add your own ideas. Do you prefer a longer, shorter or wider hemline? Should the waistband be changed?

A dropped waist has a slimming effect, whereas an empire style tends to visually add weight if you're the skinny type. Patch pockets are easy to add. Should the bodice be looser or more fitted? When you design clothes, you're the boss.

Rewards

It's really rewarding when you start designing your own fashion outfits. You'll never run out or wonder what you are going to wear to the next event or even tomorrow at work. Once you get really good, people will start asking you where you shop for clothing. That's the ultimate compliment!

Once you have your new clothes design just as you imagine, figure out the changes required to your pattern. For example, if you're making the waistband wider, lengthening the hemline and adding patch pockets, you need to calculate the change in the existing pattern pieces and create the patch pocket piece.

When modifying the pattern, lay the pattern piece over another piece of tissue paper. Trace the pattern piece. Use a transfer pen to transfer all the markings from the pattern piece to the tissue below. Now you have your new master pattern.

Getting Cloth

Purchase the necessary yardage of pattern cloth, a special fabric with a graph of all over, evenly spaced dots. Purchase extra yardage to accommodate your modifications.

Become a Pinup Model

The next step in the clothes design process is to pin-fit the pattern pieces to your body to get a preliminary idea of how your fitting works out. When you're happy with the fit, use a large stitch length, stitch your garment together and try it on. Make any final adjustments in fit right on the pattern cloth, your new master pattern.

You're now ready to sew your new creation. Your garment should fit like a glove. Now that you are designing your outfits, you might even consider making them for other people, maybe even begin a fashion career. If you live and breathe fashion trends, perhaps fashion design courses in fashion journalism is your cup of tea. You could well end up writing for Vogue, Elle or any of the top fashion magazines.

How cool is that?

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