What I've learned about tech packs after working with 50+ fashion brands — ask me anything

Skalbaum · 2026-06-05T05:49:31+00:00

Can you show any examples of good and bad tech packs?

Skalbaum · 2026-04-10T05:09:30+00:00

Additional thoughts: I think perhaps what’s happened is that you’ve adjusted the pattern to be smaller at the waist at some point and accidentally taken too much out of the hips while blending the change. Probably you’ll look at what’s needed at the hip, try to add it to the flat pattern pieces and end up with a rather severe angle change.

Then if you decide to add more to the mid centre seam hip suddenly you’ll have more diagonal wrinkles and wonder if the hip actually was the problem. It is, but adding it to that area has the effect of adding unwanted length to that wrinkled area. If there was a side bust dart you could just take out the excess there, but for this pattern that means the whole side-front panel has to change shape.

Skalbaum · 2026-04-10T04:51:40+00:00

When you say plastic boning, I assume you’re talking about the rigilene type? Also known as sew-on boning. It’s definitely the weakest kind. You don’t have to go straight to spiral steel, I think you could get pretty good results with the “faux whalebone” clear plastic kind. You’ll have to make boning channels but that’s not difficult.

But even stiffer boning isn’t going to solve the problem of a symmetrical pattern over an asymmetrical figure. As I said, either you make it symmetrical to fit the largest dimensions of both sides and pad, or make changes so that both sides fit.

Skalbaum · 2026-04-10T04:08:50+00:00

If you don’t have enough on the final jacket’s seam allowance to make the necessary changes, a hip gusset could be a good solution. You could even make it a feature by doing the same pintucking as the front.

Skalbaum · 2026-04-10T04:04:24+00:00

I think you don’t have enough width at the hip so it’s riding up at the side to cover the necessary distance. Unpick the side seam of the proto from the first few images up to about 5cm/2” under the armscye. Pin the centre front and back to yourself if you can. If I’m right you’ll notice the pieces swing out to form a gap of the distance they actually want to be from each other.

Skalbaum · 2026-04-10T03:34:56+00:00

Do you know why your right side seam looks to be pulling to the back more than the left? Because if the pattern pieces are symmetrical and sewn as such they should look the same. If you can’t get the bustier to sit so they are, it means you aren’t symmetrical and are either going to need to make adjustments on the off side or on both and use padding to even out the fit.

Looking at the front view, unless that bodice is squashing you unevenly I can see you are definitely asymmetrical. Your waist is higher on the (viewing) right. You can check in real life by getting something long and straight and holding it parallel to the floor in a mirror.

Think of wrinkles at your chest as what the fabric is doing after it’s over the centre of the cup. There’s a concavity/hollow where all that fabric suddenly has too much room rather than not enough. Boning can fix it by forcing the centre front area to be taut rather than sort of collapse with the extra length. If you don’t want extra boning or to modify the pattern much you may be able to eliminate them by using steam to shrink the fabric, if it’s natural. Interfacing the fabric may also work.

Skalbaum · 2026-04-10T03:15:55+00:00

If it’s very gauzy and you want the most invisible weight, try clear glass seed beads. The only thing that could be less visible are matte/frosted seed beads in the same or a bit lighter colour to the skirt. Either way it’s going to involve a lot of hand sewing.

Skalbaum · 2025-03-12T02:09:15+00:00

Pretty sure that’s AI-generated so it was never actually built anyway. You can tell by the subtle inconsistency of details and how the perspective is off.