When sewing doll clothes, your fabric choice plays a big part in terms of your overall experience as a beginner sewer and even for a seasoned seamstress. In this post, I will talk about what are the best types of fabrics for sewing doll clothes. These are purely based on my own opinion and personal experience from sewing and selling thousands of doll clothes over the years.
Best Types of Fabric for Sewing Doll Clothes
Woven cotton fabrics are my top choice when it comes to the best type of fabrics for making doll clothing. To be specific, I prefer the keepsake calico and lightweight quilting cotton that you can normally find in your local fabric stores like Joann or Hobby Lobby. These fabrics are very forgiving and easy to handle because they are very stable and crisp. They are also neither too thin nor too thick so they are just perfect materials for beginners.
If you want fabrics that have a little drape to them but are easy to sew as well, I would recommend eyelet and gingham. For making doll shorts and pants, linen and chambray are good choices. For special occasion outfits for your dolls, lace and satin would make beautiful doll dresses.
Most of these fabrics are woven but knit fabrics are wonderful as well for sewing doll clothes. I would not recommend them for beginners but if you are feeling confident, knit fabrics are amazing for making doll shirts, leggings and even dresses. When using knit fabrics in the store, the thicker and less stretchy the better.
Best Fabric Prints for Sewing Doll Clothes
My favorite fabric prints are flowers or any floral designs. In fact, 95% of all the doll clothes have floral prints on them. Flowers are sweet, feminine, strong and symbolical that’s why I am obsessed with them. From dainty daisies to bold peonies and sunflowers, pink and red roses, there are tons of choices you can find at the store that would look gorgeous on your dolls.
Other prints I recommend are polka dots, stripes, geometric shapes and novelty prints such as fruits and animals. And an important thing to consider is to go for the smallest prints possible. Personally, the biggest size on the prints that I would go for is 1 ½” both length and width so anything smaller than that would look proportional on the dolls.
My Favorite Fabric Colors for Sewing Doll Clothes
The colors of the fabric are important too. For spring and summer, I pick pastel colors such as pink, light blue, yellow, lavender and peach. I use white or cream only if the fabric has texture like lace and eyelet. For fall and winter, I love orange, navy, maroon and fuchsia. The colors that I stay away from for doll clothes are green, brown, gray and black. I find these clothes boring and not flattering for the dolls.
What Fabrics to Avoid
Avoid difficult fabric such as chiffon, organza, silk, rayon and thin knit fabrics with a lot of stretch. I have used them fabric many times in the past and I find that they are more time consuming and frustrating at times. I would suggest sticking to easy to work fabrics until you have build your confidence.
