Fashion Product Development: The New Black AI

Fashion product development is the process that turns a design idea into a garment a factory can make in bulk: research and brief, design concepts, line review, tech pack, pattern, samples, fit, costing, and the approval of production. It is the part of the work between the sketch and the order, and it decides most of what a garment costs and how well it fits. This guide walks through each stage, says what goes in and what comes out, and shows which steps now happen on screen before the first sample.

The stages, from brief to bulk

Cut and sew usually runs three sample rounds per style: proto, fit, pre-production. Each round is weeks, which is why the stages before the first sample matter so much.

Design concepts: many directions, cheaply

The first job is to see enough candidates to choose well. A designer used to draw them; now the concepts can be images from the first day: a description, a sketch or a fabric becomes a design in seconds, and the same design comes back in five colourways for the line review. Create a Product costs 1 credit per image with Standard AI and 3 with Pro AI, so a line review of thirty candidates costs less than one physical sample.

The tech pack: the stage that decides the sample

A complete tech pack produces a correct first sample; an incomplete one produces a sample round. It holds the flat sketches with callouts, the points of measure, the construction, the bill of materials and the size chart. On The New Black AI, the first draft is written from photos of the design or of a sample for 1 credit, each flat sketch costs 1 credit, supplier documents are read into the bill of materials for 2, and an AI review lists what the factory will ask before it asks, for 2 credits. The product developer then corrects the measurements and the construction by hand. What a tech pack is details each section.

Samples and fit: where the calendar slips

The proto sample judges the design, the fit sample judges the body, the pre-production sample is the contract. A round is lost each time a decision changes after the pattern is cut. Two habits shorten the calendar: settle the design and the colourway on screen before the proto, and photograph each sample on a model or a form with the comments pinned on the picture, so the factory reads one clear list instead of a thread of emails.

Costing: the number that kills styles

A style is only real once it has a unit cost: materials from the bill of materials, the factory's make price, trims, packaging, freight and duty. Compare it with the price the customer will pay, and a third of the line review usually goes. Doing the costing before the fit sample, not after, saves the samples of the styles that will not survive it.

A product development calendar for a small brand

Twelve weeks is a realistic first collection for a small brand with a reliable factory; most of the gain from working on screen is in weeks one to three, and in the sample rounds that are not needed.