During my fashion school I learned a lot about drawing patterns for clothes. In the beginning students do not expect they have to draw patterns. New students only have the catwalk and sketching in their mind. But designing clothes starts from scratch. Knowing the human body as the human body is in 3D or even 4D. We have to understand there is no one size for all, al though some shops sell clothes that has one size for all.

If we want to make clothes for someone, we start with measuring the person. So we don't take standard sizes we often see in shops.

After the person has been measured, we need to make a calculation. This requires some mathematic skills, but you don't need to be Pythagoras or a Harvard student to understand this.

Drawing pattern looks maybe easy to some, it may look as if you just need to draw lines from dot to dot, but it is not as simple as it looks like. We need to understand why we need to make those lines, how to adjust them the way we want it and finding out if we make a mistake, where the mistake is and how to fix it. If you never draw patterns for clothes before, then you will not understand why you have to make the lines and if you made a mistake there is no one who can help you because drawing patterns for clothes is very rare now so it is not something you can google it. That is why drawing patterns is something you need an education for.

Even after drawing the patterns above perfectly, and sewing it, there is a chance that the coat or blazer will not fit the person perfectly. Everybody has a different body type:

Besides of body types you also have people who have posture issues:

1 Low shoulders

If someone has low shoulders, you will face some problems after sewing for example a blazer. These problems are easily to be fixed by lowering the shoulder lines.

2 Lumbar Lordosis

Someone with Lumbar Lordosis will have too much fabric in the back. If this person is wearing a blazer, the blazer will fall to the back and create more space to the back and less at the front.

By pinning the excess fabric at the back, the blazer can be fixed again.

3 Kyphosis

As we often sit behind our screen, we will have this problem, unless we do enough exercise. I really need to exercise because I have this problem. Not so bad at in this image, but if I don't start exercise, I will have this back :-(.

4 Scoliosis/ Uneven shoulders

Some people have uneven shoulders and you can see, if the person is wearing a blazer, that it is uneven too. I think mostly women have this problem because we women wear handbags.

By measuring both shoulders and the back heights, the patterns can be adjusted.

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1 Flat bum

As I said before, we all are different as some have a flat bum. A person with a flat bum will mainly have excess fabric at the back. If you have this problem you can ask your tailor to customise your pants/trousers.

2 Heavy bum

People with heavy bum have more excess fabric at the front. the patterns for the back needs to be widen, creating more space and the front will fall normal again.

Unique body type

High shoulders

If someone is VERY muscled like Arnold Schwarzenegger the person will face many problems at the shoulders, chest, arms. Most heavy muscled people are broad above with a small waist. The best is to wear tailored/customised clothes and/or stretched clothes. I wish them good luck with finding good fitting clothes :-D.

Everybody is unique as we are not the same. May be if you are twins. The models on the catwalk are however required to have size 90-60-90 cm. That is 90 cm for the chest, 60 cm for the waist and 90 cm for the hips.

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