So what are these 'Design Your Own' Patterns all about?
If you have the Shirred Dress Pattern you would have read that as a kid, I loved the concept of Choose Your Own Adventure books. You come to a fork in the road and can either go left or go right. If you go left, there is a bag of chips, if you go right, there is a block of chocolate. If I got to the ending and didn't like it, I would start again until I got the outcome I wanted or I would cheat and flick back a few pages and change the ending. I would have been searching for the chip ending by the way, I love chips!!
So what that all really means is that in the handmade world, I don't think it matters if 1 person has a pattern or if 1,000,000 people have that pattern, it is what you do with the pattern to make it your own that makes the difference. The fabric you choose, the options you choose and the YOU that you bring to the pattern is what makes it unique. Make it a different way every time or if you don't like the ending or want a more fabulous ending, then change it!
I give you ideas by providing lots of options in patterns, but then, I encourage you to take it even further. Take what you have learnt in one pattern and apply it to another (whether that be my pattern or someone else's).
You may ask why there are no flutter sleeves on the pinny pattern. Trust me, it went in and out of the pattern and in and out of my head so many times that it wasn't funny. At the end of the day, I simply didn't want to tell you how to do it, I wanted you to figure it out for yourself. In hindsight, maybe that wasn't the smartest idea I have ever had, however, every single one of you who has added flutter to your straps has done it a different way, different widths, different shape and different amounts of gather. If you haven't liked the first ending, you have tried again a different way the next time, or you have flicked back a few pages (reverse sewing / unpicked it) and changed the ending! That is the essence of 'Design Your Own' and I love how you have embraced it!
I have SO many favourites and SO many that I love and am constantly blown away by all your photos in the pattern club, but here are a few people who have embraced the concept and run with it with fabulous results!
Patterns are available via my website with instant download.
From Pinny to Playsuit! Bubtique
