Left Continue shopping
Your Order

You have no items in your cart

FAQ

HOW DO I DOWNLOAD A PATTERN I BOUGHT ON YOUR SITE?

There are a number of ways to download your purchase:

  • Download immediately after purchase. Watch out for the DOWNLOAD HERE link just after you’ve paid. (Best way to get the pattern)
  • If you miss downloading when you bought the pattern, you’ll get an email receipt. That receipt includes a DOWNLOAD HERE link. Click the link in the email to download.
  • No longer have the email? You can access your account at any time to find download links.

I’VE FORGOTTEN MY LOGIN OR PASSWORD.

When you make your first purchase from Sew Modern Bags, you are sent a confirmation of your login details which includes the email address you used, and a randomly generated strong password. You can save this email for later. (It may have gone to your spam or junk folder so check there first).

I’M HAVING TROUBLE PRINTING A PATTERN.

We’ve all been there and totally understand how frustrating this can be.  Here are a few tips for you:

Check out this very useful tutorial that will help you with printing issues and includes a video how-to. How to Print PDF Sewing Patterns.

Usually, patterns will be in a PDF format.  These can be opened in your browser but this can often be the cause of printing problems.  Best to save the PDF file to your computer and open it with Adobe Reader, which is free.

If you have an older version of Adobe Reader, older than the pattern was created in, then that also might cause printing issues. You can download the current version here.

Check your print options in the preview window before printing.  You should NOT select any scaling options, centering, or fit to page.  Check that scale is at 100%.  Preview the pattern in the window before printing.  Does it look OK in the preview?

Many patterns will come with a test square that is a set size.  Print that page first and check the measurement of the test square before wasting paper and ink printing the whole pattern if your settings are off.

If you are really stuck, you can usually email the file to a friend and see if they have more luck.

Or try printing at your local library or give the file to your stationery store and ask them to print at 100% scale.  They can often print these files for you at very low cost.

If all else fails, try contacting the pattern designer and asking for help.  It might be something they have come across before and can advise you on how to print correctly.

I DON’T UNDERSTAND THE SEWING INSTRUCTIONS. CAN YOU HELP?

We don’t personally design any of the patterns we recommend or sell so we aren’t best placed to help if you get stuck. Ideally, you would contact the original pattern designer or the blogger who wrote the tutorial.  There may be contact details within the pattern itself, or you may be able to contact them via their Etsy store page, Facebook Group, or via their website.  Look out for a Contact Us page on their site.

WHY AREN’T ALL THE PATTERNS FREE?

Most of us need to earn a living or be rewarded in some way for our time, and pattern designers and sewing bloggers are no exception.  We will always share free patterns with you each week, but we also choose to showcase small independent pattern designers too and help them to support their families through sewing pattern sales. Many designers and bloggers already include so much wonderful free content for you to use and enjoy, as well as free patterns for you to try.  

From time to time, where a pattern takes more time to develop or comes with extras such as a video tutorial, or several designs/sizes in one pattern or is just a step above in terms of the design, time and testing that went into it – well, we think those excellent sewing patterns are worth the small investment. We’d sooner link you to a well-designed and well-written paid pattern than to send you to a link for a similar pattern that’s free but isn’t quite up to the same standard. We think you’ll agree that some of the free patterns you may have downloaded in the past have been frustrating, and that takes the fun out of it for all of us.

HOW CAN I CONTACT YOU?

Most questions we get are on the same sort of topics, those sort of things covered on this page so we hope these Q&A will help. But if you need to contact us on another topic, please check out our contact us page here.

DO YOU ACCEPT SUBMISSIONS?

Yes we do! If you have a bag pattern you have designed yourself, a tutorial on your blog, or a video somewhere like YouTube, we’ll be delighted to consider them for featuring on our site.  You can share a URL with us, as well as write your own article ready to publish on the site by using the form on our contact page.