For almost 170 years, the SINGER® brand has been synonymous with sewing. Isaac Singer's patent dates back to being the first consumer sewing machine in 1851. Since, Singer has brought the world's first cloud-based sewing ecosystem in 2015 to the market and now the first-ever digital pattern projection system for home sewists, a joint venture between JOANN and SINGER® called Ditto™.
Ditto, a new digital sewing technology addresses both a top frustration among sewists – 33% rank patterning tasks as their least favorite part of sewing* – and a sizable market opportunity. There are 35 million active sewists in the U.S. and sewing machine sales continue to grow, adding new consumers who are skewing younger. Meanwhile, sewists are going digital with PDF patterns from indie pattern makers.
"Ditto compresses hours into minutes, eliminating the errors, frustration, and time-consuming reality of traditional patterns," said Filippo Robotti, general manager of Ditto and vice president of strategy at SVP Worldwide. "Most importantly, Ditto is a tool to enable creativity. The same technology that accurately and easily projects patterns gives sewists the ability to customize measurements and modify the designs in just a few clicks – a concept that once seemed impossible."
The idea for Ditto began as a way to simply solve these pain points, but it has since grown into a tool that makes sewing and patterning more inclusive, more accessible, and more creative. By collaborating with real sewists throughout the three-year development process, Ditto developers identified bigger-picture needs, including made-to-measure sizing and the ability to easily modify a pattern's design.
"Every Ditto capability was created for sewists and by sewists, which resulted in a tool that delivers the freedom of expression, the freedom of fit, and the joy of garments reflecting your personal style," said Niasia Pinnock, lead designer at Ditto.
Ditto™ that combines digital projection with algorithmic intelligence to make patterns paperless, customizable, and adaptable to any body measurements in real time. In addition, to customizable and non-customizable, third-party patterns from major pattern brands, like McCall's, Simplicity and Butterick, and an array of indie pattern makers, like Style Arc, Liesl + Co., Named and Madalynne Intimates. New sewing pattern will be added monthly, by participating partners.
We reached out to Fashion Designer, Entreprenur and Factory Owner, Sandy Aouad for her comments on Singer's first-ever digital pattern projection system for home sewists. Is it really a game-changer in the fashion industry, why or why not?
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"As an owner of a factory, and an entrepreneur in the fashion industry, I will start off by saying that I personally like Singer as a brand, however I would say that Singer and JOANN's new digital sewing technology is not new of it’s kind, we’ve seen many different digital sewing technologies, it’s a google search away. However, what I have noticed is that this one is more friendly to be used, it’s for everyone basically, it’s definitely way easier than drawing the pattern by hand, every line and every curve it saves so much time. Nevertheless in my opinion definitely not such a new innovation to the point that it’s a game changer, the game has already been changed a while ago. It’s just friendlier to use," said Sandy Aouad.
Ditto™ retails for $799, do you think this is reasonable for technology of it's kind?
"The price of 799$ is reasonable as long as it’s a one time payment from a Factory’s point of view, but for a student that’s a bit overpriced," said Aouad.
Do you think Ditto™ and other digital sewing technology is the future of home sewists?
"Digital sewing technology is definitely the future of fast fashion and anything revolving around fashion as long as it’s not Haute Couture because the beauty of Haute Couture is that everything is hand made, and so many details could be added through that, that could never be drawn by a computer no matter how precise it is," said Aouad.
