---
title: Your Sewing Patterns
sidebar_position: 40
---

Our sewing patterns (patterns for short) is why most people end up on
FreeSewing.org, so they are an important part of the website.

FreeSewing does not store the pattern itself, instead we store your settings
you used to draft the design, this includes:

- Any [design options](/docs/about/site/draft/#design-options) you tweaked
- Any [core settings](/docs/about/site/draft/#core-settings) you changed
- The [UI preferences](/docs/about/site/draft/#ui-preferences) you used
- The measurements you used

With this, we can regenerate the pattern. So this is all we store.

This also means that if a pattern goes through significant changes, or a new
major version with breaking changes is released, we may no longer be able to
generate the (old) pattern. For this reason, you should download the pattern as
PDF or SVG and save it locally if you want to archive it.

:::tip
Backup your patterns if you intent to keep them for a long time
:::

In addition to the settings required to recreate the pattern, patterns are
stored with the following fields:

- [Name](#name)
- [Notes](#notes)
- [Image](#image)
- [Public](#public)

### Name

Every pattern has a **name** attribute that is mandatory.

In other words, you must give each of your patterns sets a name, but that name
can be anything you want.

### Notes

Every pattern has a **notes** attribute that is optional.

The notes field allows you to add your notes to a pattern.
This field supports markdown, so you can use rich formatting, or even embed
images.

:::note
If you make your pattern public, your notes will also be public.
:::

### Image

If you'd like you can add an **image** to your pattern, for example of the
finished make.

This can help you remember exactly what this pattern was, which can be useful
as you can end up having many patterns saved to your account.

:::note
If you make your pattern public, your image will also be public.
:::

### Public

This settings controls whether your pattern will accessible by the **public** or not.

By default, patterns are private and only you can access your own patterns. If
you'd like to share your pattern with others -- perhaps because they showed an
interest or you are looking for input -- you should first make it public.
