I promised I’d share a done-for-you option in case the idea of making your own fabric swatch book is not your cup of tea.

Type of fabric (batiste, poplin, denim, gingham, tweed, jacquard, boucle, voile, double gauze, taffeta, etc.) It’s best to have a variety of swatches within that. They can be anything. Go for what interests you! Use the fabric you have for future swatches

Proven Capability

A swatch library or a fabric swatch book is where you catalogue your fabric swatches and write down the details of a certain fabric for future reference. Why create a swatch book? Before we get into making your own DIY fabric swatch book, let’s talk about how to collect a good set of swatches. How to collect fabric swatches Having a compiled fabric swatch book can help you choose a fabric or compare fabrics from your book to ones you wish to buy to get a good match.

I’ve taken a couple of classes from Sarah Veblen on Patternreview. One is Understanding Knits and another that’s she’s not currently teaching on sheer fabrics. In each of those, there’s a kit of swatches for the class. Hopefully by now you’ve got swatches on your sewing radar. With your own fabric swatch book at hand, you’ll always have a great reference to help you demystify fabric! For now, the most important info is the name of the fabric (i.e. ponte, denim, challis, double knit etc.) and the fiber content (i.e. 100% wool, 95% cotton/5% spandex etc.). specialty knits, poly knits, cottonsI like to use a rotary cutter fitted with a pinking blade here. This will keep the edges from fraying on you. 2. Print out the Fabric Swatch Book Template

After that, print out as many copies of the Fabric Swatch Book Template as you like. I did 10 for this first batch which will hold 50 swatches. 3. Label and organize your swatches Fibre content and breakdown – 100% cotton, 45% polyester etc ( ask the vendor or look at the label for this information)This is a fantastic reference book. It has swatches in categories of fabric. It’s quite comprehensive, and there’s text explaining each fabric. When you have a collection of swatches you can thumb through them. As you feel them, you really begin to understand how each fabric might behave in the real world. You want to know how a polyester ponte is different than a ponte with rayon and polyester? That’s where you need swatches. It took me a weekend of pre-washing all the unwashed fabrics + the ones I was unsure about and created a template to keep everything organized. I thought I'd share a bit about the process and notes on how and why you should create a swatch library. But let's start at the very beginning... What is a swatch of fabric? You never know how the fabric feels, what the color actually looks like, how the fabric drapes, washes or handles until you get your hands on it. For some projects, it's OK to take a gamble, but when you are working with expensive fabrics, that's not a risk I'm willing to take. If you already own a piece of fabric, or you've already used it up for a project, it's still smart to save a swatch of your fabric. You can use it as a reference for future projects or when you're looking for similar qualities online. How do you obtain fabric swatches from (online)stores?