Pattern Drafting Book Review Series – Part 3 – Basic Pattern Skills for Fashion Design by Zamkoff & Price

Thanks for reading the third book review in my pattern making review series. This book is called Basic Pattern Skills for Fashion Design by Bernard Zamkoff and Jeanne Price. Zamkoff was my instructor of pattern making at the Fashion Institute of Technology. This is the only book I kept from my college years.

I don’t know what happened to this book, but I’m guessing I used it so much that the covers came off and I wanted to preserve it so I put it in a folder instead.

When I first started teaching pattern making out of my studio, I used this book with my students. The steps are easy to follow. This is great for a beginner in the pattern drafting. I don’t know whether this book included any slopers, but my version does not have any it, but I’m also missing pages at the end. There is no draft by measure, but drafting from measurements is not very introductory. I don’t think anyone should be drafting from their measurements until they understand how to draft.

The pivot method and slash and spread are easy to understand and follow as well as the dart manipulation and pattern alterations.

My first day in pattern class with Zamkoff, a lightbulb went off and I finally understood how everything was connected. It helped me understand the relationship between the draping and the drafting methods to create a sloper. At FIT, our focus was on draping. Drafting wasn’t offered to first years. It wasn’t offered until you were almost out of school. We learned by draping and creating patterns from our drapes. I transferred in from another school so I had extra electives available. I took this class a year before I was supposed to.

What I love about this book: Everything. It is great for a beginner, but for me, even as a beginner I had a background in draping. I wonder if I would have found this as easy to follow had I not taken draping first. Either way, this is great book.

What I dislike: That I lost part of the book, but not the books fault. I just used it too much I guess. I would question whether someone being introduced to this book without any pattern or draping knowledge would struggle.

I thought this book was out of print, but it looks like the second edition is still available on Amazon. Here is the link. Note that it is an affiliate link and affiliate links help support my business. Basic Pattern Skills for Fashion Design