Butterick's graded paper patterns
Patrones de papel graduados de Butterick
- Date
- 1863 · confidence high
- Place
- Sterling, Massachusetts, United States
- Credited to
- Ebenezer Butterick and Ellen Butterick
- Field
- Tools
⚠️ Disputed: the sources disagree.
What it is
Printed tissue-paper patterns in several sizes sold in envelopes so that anyone could cut clothes at home. At first for men's and boys' shirts (1863) and from 1866 for women.
The Butterricks were the first to retail graded paper patterns at scale; earlier, Madame Demorest (1850s) sold fashion patterns by mail and her priority for the printed pattern is disputed.
What it led to
- widespread home sewing together with the sewing machine
- spread of Paris fashion to the middle classes
- graded size systems and mass pattern retailing