Dressing Up Barbie - Your Sewing Options
Barbie clothes can get expensive. If you are not a collector who is picky about purchasing Mattel brand items, sewing your Barbie’s clothes can save you a bundle of money.
To make Barbie clothes, you need to first make or buy a pattern, and then you can choose any material you like to make the clothing. Her wardrobe will grow and you can have more fun dressing up Barbie- your sewing options:
1. Buy patterns for Barbie clothes at a local sewing/hobby shop or online.
 Buy any material you like and sew according to the pattern.
2. Use Barbie clothes you already have to make patterns. Perhaps you have other dolls, use their patterns as well.
3. Find old, worn-out Barbie clothes at garage sales and flea markets to use as patterns.
4. Design your own patterns.
5. Have your daughter help you design patterns; she will love to see the results.
6. Purchase the Barbie Fashion Designer CD-ROM. This program prints out pictures of Barbie clothes that can be used for patterns. It also prints out real clothes on special felt paper.
7. Attach Velcro to clothes instead of buttons or snaps. It is easier for children to use. If you give Barbie clothes as gifts you will have Moms thanking you.
8. Add lace, trim or fake buttons to dress clothing up. Use your jewelry box to find odds and ends of things that will accessorize an outfit nicely. Beads and costume jewelry can instantly perk up a dress.
9. Look for fun and wild patterns and materials. You will be able to find a lot of good things in the clearance bins at sewing shops because you only need a small amount of the material.
10. Consider making Barbie clothes and outfits for your child using similar material and patterns.
11. Reuse material from clothes your child has outgrown or leftover pieces of material from clothes your child already owns.
12. Understand that some materials just don’t work for Barbie clothes. Because the clothes are so small, thick materials such as wide wale corduroy or heavy wool will be too cumbersome.  Consider who will be using the material and if it will be played with often.
13. Consider what items of clothing are missing from the Barbie collection. Many collections are short on sleepwear and underwear. Swimsuits are usually not needed.
14. Use fabrics with small prints, checks or stripes. Large floral motifs just don’t work with Barbie-sized clothing. This makes it too obvious that you have taken your apron and turned it into Barbie’s summer dress.
15. Use materials that can take a lot of handling. Fine silks look lovely, but will fall apart under the play of children. Fancy, delicate fabrics are okay if your doll is not going to be played with. No sense in doing all that work or detail work just for little hands to tear it off.
16. Plastic buttons made for dolls clothes sometimes very oversized and thick and definitely overpriced. Try an old leather hole punch with a spoke like choice of sized hole punches. Punch out buttons from a variety of jar lids or other items. Use a darning needle to make the two holes in the punched discs over a pad of corrugated cardboard. These buttons work as well as real ones. Button holes reinforced with a little lightweight iron-on stiffener, embroidered with a satin stitch and opened very carefully with nail scissors provides, the perfect place for these buttons.
17. A short cut for those who do not like to sew is always the Velcro route. Take a sleeve from an old shirt and rap it around Barbie. Trim, shape, and glue the Velcro on with a glue gun.
18. Sewing three different outfits at once makes a nice mini-wardrobe and also makes the time spent getting out all of your sewing supplies worth it.
19. Make multiple outfits with the same pattern. Using a variety of material this can quickly expand your Barbie wardrobe.
20. Use the same patterns for Barbie’s friends and you did for Barbie, just different material. This makes mass production easier.
Enjoy your designs - the fact that you made the clothes yourself makes them special.
