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Pt 2. Screen to seam: PDF sewing patterns

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Avoiding dodgy or AI Slop Sewing Patterns

Sadly, Artificial Intelligence slop sewing patterns are becoming a real problem. Buying directly from indie designers, or from reputable aggregated stores like the ones we covered in Part 1, is one of the best ways to avoid them. AI may eventually handle the heavy lifting of drafting patterns and grading size sets, but we’re not there yet.

This is the second article of Screen to seam: PDF sewing patterns, in it we’ll look at tips to avoid AI Slop.

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Pt 1. Screen to seam: PDF sewing patterns

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Where to Buy PDF Sewing Patterns

In early 2026 Simplicity McCalls announced a global restructure that will close their Sydney warehouse and stop shipping to Australia – read the Guardian Article here. If you have been sewing for years, the move to getting your patterns online might be new and totally unfamiliar.

In our first article of Screen to seam: PDF sewing patterns we’ll discuss where to buy your sewing patterns.

If you’re in Melbourne and like learning in person, check out the booking page for How to buy & print sewing patterns online. If it’s not currently scheduled, join our waitlist.

Once we would head into a fabric store and sit down to browse through the huge catalogues of sewing patterns from Simplicity, McCalls, Butterick, Vogue and Burda. Finding one you liked, you then went to the filing cabinets to find your desired pattern…

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#MeMadeMay

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2019 is the TENTH year of the #MeMadeMay challenge. It is all about building your relationship with your handmade wardrobe. To take part, make a pledge to wear the garments you made yourself more and/or in different ways.  Then you showcase it throughout May. By the end of May, you will have learnt a whole load about yourself, your style, how you feel about your wardrobe, and how best to spend your clothes-making time going forwards.
To officially set your pledge, click the logo and visit So,Zo the creator of #MeMadeMay.
To Celebrate Thread Den is discounting selected classes in May to get you sewing more!

Amazing A Line Skirts

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Over 5 hours these gorgeous students made their own A Line skirts. The skirt waist is finished with a facing, they learnt to insert a lapped zip, use the overlockers, sew back waist darts and hem. This is the workshop that they did – The Simple A Line Skirt.

Sewing Lessons:

This photo demonstrates two things: 1) Always press your projects.  The skirt on the left hasn’t had a final press and looks terrible. 2) Don’t ask a cheeky ten year old boy to take a photo of your matching A Line skirts!

Types of Pattern Making Paper

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  • Cardimage – popular for the durability of the pattern pieces you can draft and the ease of tracing around. If you have a favourite paper pattern that you use a lot, trace it onto pattern card and it will last you much longer.
  • Dash cross guided paper – has a gloss finish to allow magic tape to come off without tearing, dash cross markings make grading and general drafting a dream, light enough to see commercial patterns placed underneath.

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Where to now?

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If you have completed the Sewing Basics Course – congratulations! Well done on jumping in and getting to know the machines and the basics of sewing.

Don’t let everything you’ve learnt go to the dark recesses of your mind.  If you don’t keep using your new skills they’ll wind up back there with the knowledge of how long to boil an egg with soft, medium or hard yolk (every time I have to look it up… EVERY time).

So let’s look at projects, resources and information to keep you going!

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