
…custom croquis…
The more I get into sewing, and the more I scroll sewing insta, the more I get thinking about different way to combine shapes and silhouettes to create something unique. Most recently, I’ve had a delivery of swimwear fabric that I can’t wait to make up into something cute for summer.
The starting point is obviously to sketch it out. Sketching it out requires a croquis/blank model to sketch on. The problem with stock design croquis is they are tall and willowy and ideally figured, and I am…not. I’ve been pondering it for a couple of days and this morning I hit on a solution.
I would DIY it. Because why wouldn’t I?
Once I hit upon the idea, it was such an obvious solution. It took under 10 minutes to pull together, in the end. I popped on some well fitting active wear (my Avery leggings, and a commercial crop top), and got one of the kids to snap a couple of full length photos on my phone.
From there, I simply airdropped them to my iPad and imported them to a new a4 file in procreate. To create the croquis, I lowered the opacity of the photo and enlarged it to take up most of the page. On a new layer, I chose a black 6B pencil brush, large size, and started sketching the outline. Once I had the outline, I added another new layer to mark bust/waist/hips for proportions when I’m sketching. Repeat the process for the second pose and… voila!

Two me-shaped design blanks to sketch all my ideas on!! Far from perfect, obviously – the neckline on the front-on me needs fixing for a start – but they will work perfectly as a base layer that I can refine and tidy up on actual design sketches. I’ve also left the reference photos in the file, and just turned them off, so I can compare designs to an actual me, not just a sketched me.
With that done, it’s time to get to the fun part of actually getting this ideas out of my head and onto paper…or onto screen, more correctly. I have 6 weeks until what will hopefully be our first beach weekend of the season, so plenty of time to tweak my swimmers design and get them made up…who am I kidding. Six weeks? I’m cancelling my weekend plans and working on the pattern first thing tomorrow!
I don’t have a horrible figure by anyone’s standards but shopping for swimsuits about did me in this summer. (First time I’d shopped for one in YEARS.). Do designers not think some of us might want to cover our cheeks? Can’t wait to see what you come up with!
Yes! Butt coverage is a must!! I hate shopping for swimmers and normally just go for a rashie & boardies. Our fave resort has plenty of poolside shade though so I’m looking forward to actually wearing cute swimmers this year