"Sewing patterns have been the principle blueprint for making garments in the home for centuries. From their origins in the tailoring manuals of the 16th century to the widely produced pamphlets of ...

An illustration of a magnifying glass. An illustration of a magnifying glass.

When some of us hear the word 'pattern', we can immediately feel the texture of fine paper and the anxiety of losing one of the pieces; can hear the distant whirr of a sewing machine. A small personal ...

Affordable sewing machines and commercial patterns made home dressmaking widespread in the 20th century. The paper pattern industry helped democratise fashion and entrepreneurship (Buchart, 2013).

In the current age when many people can't sew a button on a shirt, Dinah Vincent's PhD thesis reveals a not-too-distant era when dressmaking was a defining, even vital, skill for many New Zealand ...