So this article and stitching and plagiarism came up on my radar the other day.

I tweeted it and there was some interesting discussion about it. I made a little diagram of the ways that people act when they steal designs, and what I consider to be best practices. To see all of it, just click on the photo to expand it. (Feel free to tell me if I left something out or was otherwise in error.)

 

However, there are two things that got left out.

1. Figuring out a design from a company and then posting about it. Right? Or wrong? I’m not going to link to any examples because you can find them with a quick Google, and I don’t want anyone to think I’m calling them out for bad behavior. If it’s best practice not to take another designer’s design and tell everyone else how to make it vs. buying the pattern, what if the designer is a company? Is that okay? As you’ll see in #2, it’s legal to do, whether they’re a big company or a much smaller designer. But is it kind?

Personally, I think figuring it out and sharing it is more about ego than it is about anything else. It says, “look at me! I’m clever enough to figure out someone’s pattern! Now tell me how awesome I am!” And when that “someone” is someone in your community, don’t expect to be welcomed into that community. When that “someone” is a store or couture designer? Your figured-out design may help some people who couldn’t otherwise afford the finished store-bought item, which is good.

But it also opens some gray areas, because what if instead of figuring out a sweater, it’s figuring out how to make your own pumpkin-spice latte? Then it becomes a conversation about what we put into our bodies, not just what we spend money on. Then it becomes an issue of what we value and what’s been devalued. It stays an issue about handmade vs. store-bought. I don’t have an answer here, only that it’s blurry. And that I like making a pumpkin spice latte at home with purer ingredients than Starbucks’. And that these gray areas of life both infuriate me as much as they endear me to it.

Have thoughts on this gray area? Lemme hear them!

2.  OMG. Just tell me already, am I stealing when I “copy” someone else’s design? 

When it comes to things that fall under the frame of fashion? If you’re in the United States, the answer is NO.

When it comes to your stuffed animals or paintings or coin purses? That gets tricky. But, the long and the short of it is this, is your product making you a good stand-up craft community member? Or are you straight-up stealing someone’s ideas for profit? Would you feel good about showing your design to the person who made what you’re trying to emulate? Or does that idea make you feel sick? Because with making things, you become part of a community. If you want to be part of it, stick to your own ideas.

So, that being settled, I went looking for some proof of the first question. I found this, on this blog post, the entirety of which is pretty helpful:

In current copyright law of the United States, there is no prevention of copying of fashion designs. Copyright may protect elements of a garment like the patterns or prints in their textiles or other materials, but garments and accessories themselves are usually considered functional and thus unprotected.

I went looking for more. And more I found. Here and here are two helpful posts in this area. Here is an example of this discussion on Etsy wherein people come to the conclusion that people who steal are lame (because they are) and that the best thing to do is go make something better.

There was very little information on the interwebs about this from an actual .gov address, y’know, something that showed what the actual deal is. Then I came across this little beauty of a post, which included this information:

“Features that can be identified separately from, and are capable of existing independently of, the utilitarian aspects of [clothing]” can be protected by copyright.

The bit in quotes is from a .gov domain, a copyright.gov domain no less, and appears on a page entitled Protection on Fashion Design. I haven’t read the whole thing, but was intrigued that it mentioned something called “hull splashing,” which sounds weird in the context of fashion design. However, looking further into it, it’s actually not very exciting in reality.

So, wait a minute. What did we learn again?

That stealing is lame, except perhaps in the case of the DIY pumpkin-spice latte.

And that yeah, you can “steal” a design when it comes to fashion if you’re making something utilitarian.

However, if you’re planning on being a part of an actual community, it’s a pretty crap idea. And as anyone who has ever designed something for themselves knows, the thrill of making something your own? It beats the feeling of stealing any day.