When I have an idea for a new soft toy, going from a sketch to a set of pattern pieces can be a daunting task. How do I make those shapes in three-dimensions? Where do I begin?
Having comfort and familiarity with an assortment of different pattern building blocks makes this task much easier. I can select from among them to achieve the shape I have in mind.
I am going to do posts on each of these building blocks to help build familiarity with them. That way they will all be out there for us to draw from when we are doing our own design work.
One really useful building block is the pointed oval pattern piece. Think of it like a segment of an orange.
A pointed oval looks like this:
It can be elongated or shortened:
It can also be widened on one end:
What can you do with a pointed oval?
If you sew three pointed ovals together,
you'll get a football:
If you sew four pointed ovals together,
your football becomes more round.
Sew together four elongated pointed ovals that have been widened on one end and you'll get a carrot or a chili pepper.
Sew five regular pointed ovals and you can make the round body of a goldfish. If you'd like to try this with a pattern, my free goldfish pattern over there on the left uses this technique.
Shrink them down tiny and you can sew a soft egg for a soft sculpture hen:
Or make the egg larger and sew up Humpty Dumpty:
Think about what toy you could design based on one of these shapes, or what part of a toy. You could make a turnip, the body of a squid, a jack-o-lantern...I'm getting excited now!
Keep in mind that the finished shape will have seams running down the sides at regular intervals. These seams are opportunities. Every time you sew a segment together you have the opportunity to easiy and inobstrusively insert something - a fin, spikes, arms.
The ends of your fininished shape may not be perfect because all the points are coming together on the ends. If your ends are a bit wonky, you may want to cover them up with a carrot top or fish lips.
Have you designed a pattern that uses pointed ovals? What did you make? Maybe give us a link so we can see it and get inspired. Do you have a good method for sewing the ends, where all those points meet up, more neatly? Any other good tips to add? Please share in the comments! You guys are awesome.
