How to join Instagram Sewing Challenges

What is an Instagram sewing challenge?

An Instagram sewing challenge is a community-driven event on Instagram where participants are encouraged to engage with a specific theme. Often, this involves sewing a project inspired by the theme and sharing the finished make to Instagram within a certain time frame. Challenges are hosted by creators or brands in the sewing community. There is usually a challenge-specific hashtag to identify entries into the challenge and the hosts can be tagged to ensure they see your entry too. Some sewing challenges offer sponsored prize draws for extra motivation.

Why join sewing challenges?

• 💪 Motivation – It’s all too easy to plan sewing projects and never get round to making them! Sewing challenges provide a deadline to aim for, which can be the push you need to get your project completed.
• 💡 Inspiration – Lots of sewing enthusiasts will also be joining in with the challenge, so checking out the hashtag and following the hosts can be a great way to get inspired. You’ll likely discover new patterns, fabrics, techniques and accounts to follow thanks to the challenge.
• 🤗 Community – Engaging with sewing challenges you’re interested in can be a great way to meet sewists with similar interests. Don’t be afraid to comment on their challenge posts and message them about their projects – you could make new online sewing friends!
• 🛠️ Skill Development – Challenges are a perfect opportunity to push yourself out of your comfort zone and try something new. Many challenge hosts will share their own tips to inspire you (for example, upcycling ideas for the #ReFebulous challenge).
• 🎁 Prizes – A lovely bonus is that you could also be entered into a prize draw in some challenges! Small businesses in the sewing community will sponsor prizes to support sewing challenges. Check out the details of challenges you’re interested to see what’s up for grabs. You’ve got to be in it to win it!

How to find Instagram sewing challenges

Every month, I share a roundup of all the sewing challenges in the Challenges section of Stash Hub. You can save sewing challenges you’re interested in joining and link them to your sewing project plans in the Stash Hub app. Watch this video tutorial about how to use the Stash Hub challenges section. There’s also a monthly challenge round up blog post right here on the Stash Hub blog and a summary on our Instagram, @stash_hub.

You can also keep an eye out for sewing challenges on Instagram yourself. They may pop up on your Instagram feed or For You Page. You can try searching hashtags such as #SewingChallenges, although unfortunately it’s no longer possible to sort posts by date, so you may not see current challenges. If you discover a sewing challenge that isn’t listed in Stash Hub (or are planning to host one!), please send the post with the challenge details to @stash_hub on Instagram so I can add it to the app.

The @sewover50 sewing community is great at sharing sewing challenges, so check out their monthly challenge Highlights, just below the bio at the top of their profile.

How to join Instagram sewing challenges

Create a public Instagram account

The first step to joining in with Instagram sewing challenges is to get yourself on Instagram. Read this tutorial to create yourself an account. If your Instagram account is set to Private, only people that follow you will be able to see your posts. You’ll need to update your Account Privacy to Public if you want to join in with sewing challenges, as hosts won’t be able to see posts from private accounts.To switch your Instagram account from private to public, go to your profile, tap the three lines in the top right corner, select “Settings and Privacy,” then tap “Account Privacy.” Toggle off the “Private Account” setting to make your account public.

If you already have an Instagram account that you use to share personal posts with your friends and family, consider creating a new Instagram account specifically for sewing. This way, you can create a public account whilst keeping your personal memories private.

Follow challenge rules

Each sewing challenge will have different criteria for joining in. Click into the challenge in Stash Hub to read the description, or find the original post on Instagram for details on how to join in. Here are some things to look out for:

• Make sure your project idea fits within the challenge brief. For example, some challenges only accept garment projects, whereas others are more flexible.
• Check the challenge hashtag and make sure you spell it correctly.
• Post within the timeframe of the challenge. Some challenges allow you to post at anytime during the month, whilst others have a specific reveal day when you should share your entries.

Share to Instagram

• Take a photo of your make. The easiest way to get high quality pictures is to use the back camera of your smart phone in natural light – so ask someone else to take photos of you in your outfit outside. You can also get inexpensive tripods and remotes if you don’t have anyone to help you take photos (although make sure your tripod doesn’t blow over in the wind if you’re using it outside!). The ideal aspect ratio for Instagram is 4:5 portrait, and you can share up to 20 images in a single post.
• Post to Instagram. Open Instagram and tap the Plus button in the middle of the bottom tool bar. Select Post from the options at the bottom (Post/Story/Reel/Live). You’ll see a preview of your post at the top and a grid of your gallery at the bottom. Find the image you want to share and select it. If you want to share multiple images, tap the multi-select option on the right hand side above your image gallery. The numbers indicate the order that the photos will appear in. Once you have selected your image(s) tap Next at the top right. You have options to add music to your post, text or image overlays onto your picture or add filters/edits to your image. These are all optional. Tap Next at the bottom right when you are happy.
• Write Instagram caption. The next screen shows a preview of your post, with a box below to enter your caption. You can write anything you like here, including how you found the process or how the finished project makes you feel. I’d recommend mentioning the pattern designer and where you got the fabric from, as this can help support small businesses in the sewing community. Type @ followed by the Instagram handle of the business into your caption and it will link to their account. It can also be very helpful to share the size you made if you’re sharing garment sewing projects. Don’t forget to talk about the sewing challenge you entered and mention the challenge host in your caption too.
• Tag challenge host. ‘Tag People’ is an option below the caption. Tap on this to tag the challenge host. This means your post will show in the ‘tagged posts’ section of their profile and they won’t miss your entry into the challenge.
• Prize draws – Most Instagram sewing challenge hosts will contact you via Instagram direct messages (DMs), so keep an eye on your inbox. Make sure to follow the challenge host. If you don’t follow the host, their message will go into your requests and you won’t receive a notification. You wouldn’t want to miss out on claiming your prize! Some challenges also ask you to follow their sponsors, as they may contact you directly. You can follow an account by visiting their profile and tapping the ‘Follow’ button underneath the bio.

Have loads of fun engaging with sewing challenges! We’d love to see what you’re up to, so tag us @stash_hub in your Instagram posts!