Custom Hoodie Pockets

“If you design the hoodie yourself, it’s smart to design your own artwork for the pockets and lining too – that way they match! Doing this also saves a bit of money since you won’t have to design 2 different sets of artwork and Custom Hoodie Pockets.”

Table of Contents

Here is How to Prepare Artwork for Custom Hoodie Pockets and Hood Linings:

  • Hoodies are one of the most versatile forms of clothing available. They can be worn almost anywhere from the beach, to the gym, to a concert or even just around town. This article will show how to design a custom pocket design for your brand new HTV hoodie. It will cover how to design from the ground up in Adobe Illustrator. This is just one method but there are many other ways to create this design so feel free to experiment with different methods if you wish.
  • Before design, the size of pocket is determined.  We have an extra small hoodie so the design will be half the width of a small hoodie which has a design width of 10 inches. Creating a design this way makes it easier to design for different sizes by simply scaling up or down in Illustrator without having to design each individual pocket from scratch.
  • In order to scale the design you need proper reference points from your artwork that will line up on both sides when scaled up or down in Illustrator later on. In this case we add guidelines every 5 cm starting from 0cm at top left corner and going clockwise around design with 15 cm, 30cm, 45 cm and lastly 60cm mark added. These design points will be used to scale the design up and down.
  • To design the design we use a combination of the gradient tool along with predesigned vector shapes that can easily be found on free design sites such as To create a patch design like this it’s easiest to make an oval shape with the gradient tool, copy and paste it and then simply rotate and resize as desired accordingly to patch design below.  Once satisfied with the design, select all objects (ctrl+a) and go to Window > Pathfinder palette to unify objects into one single object by clicking Unite button shown in the image below:
  • At this point you can also add any text on top of the design.  Simply select the text tool, click anywhere on design and input desired text to design.
  • The design is now complete! To save it for future use right-click design layer in layer palette and select save as… Then simply save the design as an .ai file. If you are planning on selling the design to clients or other artists this would be an ideal place to add your copyright by going Object > Lock > Selection (ctrl+2) then right-clicking the selection box and selecting ‘add copyright’ with the current year. Then save the design again as an .ai file once more after doing that.
  • To import this design into Studio Artist go File > Open… And navigate where the saved design is located then open it by double-clicking .ai file.
  • Once design is open in Studio Artist simply select design and click Object > Expand Appearance to turn the design into individual vectors.  To resize design to fit pocket outline go Image > Trim and input the dimensions of the design that will be placed onto the hoodie.  
  • The design is now ready to be placed on a white background! To do this, go Image > Canvas Size… And set Width and Height values for canvas size as desired.  It’s best practice to keep canvas white so design doesn’t take up more color than necessary with unnecessary additional colors such as black outlined text which eats up at least 3 colors per letter if not changed to same color as background. Also make sure Raster Effects are turned off.  Once design is placed onto new canvas you want to crop design so new white outlined design becomes 5 inches or half of design width. To do this, go Image > Crop… And input desired size. Then save design as new .ai file with copyright and current year added on design layer for future use.
  • If you plan on selling the design then I highly suggest saving it in .png format which can be done by going File > Export for web… to export design at high resolution but just remember not to add raster effects when cutting design out later on since it eats up 3 colors per letter outlined in black which could potentially reduce color count by 6-9 colors if every letter in design has black outline. However, .png design should only be used for design that will not be cut out onto hoodie such as design layer shown below:
  • For design that will be cut out and sewn on to the hoodie, go File > Export… And export design in .ai format which can then be imported into Studio Artist.
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Conclusion: 

By designating design size and shape as well as raster effects to be turned off during design export, the design will consume fewer colors and save more ink which can cut design cost drastically.  You can also design your own hoodie and Custom Hoodie Pockets using the same steps above with different designs for fun!

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