# About SewnBy - A system for managing fabrics, patterns and sewing projects

I have been sewing for years, so I know how easily fabrics, patterns, notes, photographs and unfinished projects can pile up without you noticing. You may remember that there is a length of green suiting wool in the wardrobe, yet have no idea whether there is enough left for a jacket, whether it has been pre-shrunk or what you originally bought it for. The same happens with patterns: the file is definitely somewhere, but finding it means searching your computer, Telegram and folders whose names no longer tell you anything.

Over time, it becomes difficult to keep all the connections between these things in your head. The fabric was bought for a particular pattern, the pattern was adjusted after a fitting, the lining has already been chosen, and the right zip is lying in one of the boxes. Every detail still exists somewhere, yet when you need it, you have to reconstruct the whole picture.

Another folder or spreadsheet was not going to solve this. I wanted to see everything at a glance: which fabrics I had, how much was left, what they were intended for, which projects were already underway and what was still missing. Since I am a software developer, I decided to build the system myself. That is how SewnBy began.

Today, SewnBy lets you manage a collection of fabrics and patterns, save measurements, plan projects and keep a shopping list. When you assign a fabric to a project, the required length is reserved, so it cannot accidentally be planned for several garments at once. If your plans change, the fabric returns to the available stock.

A pattern record can hold files, sizes, fabric requirements and your own adjustments—the kind of details that usually end up scribbled in margins, written on loose sheets of paper or not recorded at all. A project brings together everything connected with a future garment: the pattern, main fabric and lining, measurements, notions, photographs and current stage of work. Even after a long break, you can open it and immediately see where you left off.

Keeping perfectly tidy records has little value on its own. The information needs to be useful when you are choosing your next project, preparing to cut the fabric or heading to the shop. SewnBy is built around these ordinary moments: checking how much fabric remains, finding the right file, recalling an adjustment or noticing that you are still missing one zip.

I want keeping everything in order to feel easy. Much of the information about a fabric or pattern already exists somewhere—in a product listing, a shop invoice or a saved file. Over time, SewnBy should take over more of that routine work by helping to import existing information, sort accumulated files and identify duplicates. You will then only need to check the result and add the details that come from your own experience.

Later, the records you build up will also help when choosing new projects. The system will take your own experience into account: which fabrics you selected, which sizes you made, what you changed in the patterns and how much material you actually used. Once you have found a solution that works, it should not be lost before the next season.

I am building SewnBy for people who sew regularly and eventually outgrow a single box of fabrics and one folder of patterns. For some, it will be a way to organise their fabric stash; for others, a tool for running a small studio. For someone else, the collection of completed projects may eventually become the foundation of their own brand.

The name SewnBy reads like a signature on a garment label: *sewn by you*. The system keeps everything behind those three words—the materials, decisions, adjustments and experience that eventually become a finished garment.

— From the creator of SewnBy

I continue to develop SewnBy and see it from two perspectives: as a software developer and as someone who sews. I test new ideas in my own sewing projects and keep only what genuinely helps in practice. SewnBy began as a tool I built for myself, and now I want to make it useful for others too.

— Creator of SewnBy