Making plaid in Procreate is easy. You can start with either horizontal or vertical lines and you can put all of your colors on the same layer or different layers. With your own experimenting, you will start to figure out your preference with this. Now do the same thing in the other direction with a different layer (you can also turn drawing assist off so the grid lines go away, drawing assist will still be applied to your layers). Since I have a light background color on this design, I am playing with how this looks using the Multiply Blend Mode which makes the overlapping areas amazing. I love this look. I also reduce the opacity of each layer which is what you will need to rely on if you have a dark background.
Procreate allows you to “snap” lines perfectly straight but it isn’t always accurate for perfect vertical and horizontal. So I use the Drawing Assist on the 2D Grid. Easy-peasy! You can get my big monoline brush in my Potpourri brushset free as a newsletter subscriber here or edit the native brush to make it bigger. Then go into Actions, Canvas, turn on Drawing Guide, which will default to 2D grid. The top and the bottom need to match, and the left and right need to match. The easiest way to achieve this is to use a monoline brush that has no texture whatsoever and also doesn’t vary in width!
One of the biggest considerations is making sure your stripes lineup perfectly, the width AND the texture. The patterns for Lorelei, Emily, and Sookie are same in different sizes. You don’t have to make big bold hero patterns to do well there. This is surprising to me. As I mentioned in a past post, you can have fun with pattern-making even if you don’t sell on Spoonflower. The patterns below are all from the above pattern. I hope this gives you some inspiration to make your own!
To ensure seamless plaid, check it for seams (we talked about that in part 1) and of course, you will want to see a zoomed out version of it to really see the plaid. The easiest method to achieve a seamless plaid is to duplicate and rotate patterns on separate layers, then align the seams visually. TIP 1: Experiment with texture brushes, just watch those seams really carefully. Watch the seams for textures within the lines as well as the textured edges of the lines. TIP 2: If you want your horizontal set of lines to be identical to your vertical ones, you can draw them once, duplicate them, and rotate one set. But when you rotate, select the layer you want to rotate AND a filled layer at the same time. That way, the rotation point is in the middle of the canvas. TIP 3: If you separate all of your lines onto different layers, you will have more flexibility with the looks you can achieve. I also like to keep the same colors together in the layers. Keeping lines separate also means you can make this plaid pattern once in Procreate, duplicate it, and make other color variations. You can also play with the opacity of each layer individually.
The possibilities are endless. Making plaid in Procreate is easy, and you can study the lines to understand the basic block that forms a traditional plaid pattern. If you want to learn even more, check out diagonal plaid patterns in Procreate and related tutorials to deepen your technique and expand your Procreate arsenal.
Tips and practical steps for building plaid in Procreate
- Set up a light and dark background to explore how Multiply and other blend modes affect overlap.
- Use Drawing Assist with a 2D grid to keep lines aligned, then toggle it off to see the final result.
- Keep lines on separate layers to easily adjust color variations and opacity later.
- Duplicate horizontal and vertical line sets, rotate, and align the rotation point to the canvas center for symmetry.
- Experiment with texture brushes while monitoring seam integrity and edge textures.
As you progress, you can study the lines and figure out what the basic block is to emulate a traditional plaid. For beginners, starting with monoline lines and simple color overlays can yield excellent results quickly. The key is consistency across lines and mindful adjustments of opacity to suit different background colors.
More advanced learners can explore color variations by grouping colors by layer and creating multiple colorways from a single plaid pattern. You can also implement a simple workflow to copy and paste patterns across layers for rapid experimentation.