Sewing Machine – How To Successfully Make & Dye Clothes

In Stardew Valley, the only way to craft custom-tailored clothes for your character is through the Sewing Machine. This piece of equipment is used to craft or dye clothing. It cannot be sold, and is only unlocked and available to use after completing Emily’s special order request. You can tailor new hats, shirts, and pants with Cloth and (almost) any object placed in the spool. 

Unlocking the Sewing Machine

There are two ways to unlock the sewing machine: a cutscene or a Special Order quest from Emily. Activating the cutscene will grant access to the sewing machine in Emily and Haley’s house. Completing the quest will reward you with a personal sewing machine. 

Emily’s Cutscene 

To activate the cutscene, you’ll need to have at least 1 Cloth in your inventory and exit your Farmhouse between 6am – 11am. Emily talks to you about her Sewing Machine, and after the cutscene ends, it will useable. This cutscene also grants access to her dye pots. 

Emily and Haley’s Home

Sisters Emily and Haley live at 2 Willow Lane, located on the southern road in Pelican Town. Their house is open for entry from 9:00a – 8:00p. 

To the right of their living room, you can find Emily’s sewing machine and dyeing pots. 

Special Order Quest

Emily rewards you with a Sewing Machine after you complete the ‘Rock Rejuvenation’ Special Order Quest. This quest requires each of the five different gem types: Amethyst, Emerald, Jade, Ruby, and Topaz.

All of these gems can be easily found in the Pelican Town Mines. Though each can randomly spawn on any floor, some are more likely found on specific floors. 

Note: Emerald and Jade will spawn on any floor (like Amethyst) after you reach the bottom of the Mines. 

Emily will gift you a personal Sewing Machine that you can then place anywhere on your Farm or Shed after quest completion. It works identically to the one in her house. 

How To Use The Sewing Machine

After interacting with it, the sewing machine interface will appear with two open slots. The bottom left slot is the Feed slot, typically for Cloth. The right slot, above the power button, is the Spool slot. This is where the thread would go, but in Stardew Valley, we can use objects instead. 

An object placed in the spool will be used as the prospective color and style of the output clothing. Depending on the object, the machine will generate a piece of clothing that takes on a characteristic of the object. One Cloth and one object will make one piece of clothing. 

After inserting items in both slots, a clothing shape will appear on the right-panel. If the tailoring combination is new, there will be a question mark with the outline of the clothing. If you use a known combination, you will see the picture of the item instead of an outline.

When you confirm your choices, select the power button to turn on the Sewing Machine and receive your clothes.

Tailoring Guide

Learn more about how to make cloth, transferring footwear stats, and more in this quick tailor guide.

Making Cloth

There are a few ways to make Cloth. You can make it via a loom and wool, recycling machine, or gain it as a potential drop from combat.

Crafting a Loom & Farming Wool

To craft a loom, you’ll first need to reach Farming level seven to unlock its recipe. Then, you’ll need the following materials: 60 Wood, 30 Fiber, and 1 Pine Tar. 

To farm wool, you will need a Deluxe Barn to hold Sheep or a Deluxe Coop to hold Rabbits. After either animal type grows up, they will start to produce wool. 

Without an auto-grabber, Sheep will need to be sheared to get it. Rabbits will drop it on the floor. 

You can make Cloth by placing wool into a Loom. Over time, it will turn into Cloth. 

Using a Recycling Machine 

If you don’t want to invest in farm animals, there’s a 10% chance to make Cloth by placing Soggy Newspaper in the Recycling Machine. However, there’s a 90% chance it will make a Torch.

Monster Drops

Cloth can be dropped by slain mummies in the Skull Cavern. There is a 5-20% chance that it will drop after killing a mummy.

Mummies spawn in Skull Cavern rooms that resemble an Egyptian tomb. To kill them, you need to attack them until they collapse into bandages, then bomb its remains. Any bomb will work. If you don’t bomb the mummy during its time down, it will rise from its bandages and fight you again. 

Clothing Types

There are four main types of clothing in Stardew Valley: hats, shirts, pants, and shoes. Since shoes are considered a combat item, it cannot be crafted by the Sewing Machine. However, you can transfer stats across different shoes. 

Note: Though you can sell boots and shoes to the Adventurer’s Guild, you cannot sell shirts, pants or hats anywhere in-game. 

Hats

Crafted hats range from typical hats (like a fedora and straw hat) to masks. The masks will take on the facial characteristics of the object used in the spool. For instance, if you combine a Blobfish + Cloth, you will get a Blobfish Mask that resembles the fish. 

You can buy additional hats from the Hat Mouse, but you cannot sell any to them. Additionally, you can’t craft every hat in the game, some are earned through achievements and completed quests. For example, to get the Skeleton Mask, you need to defeat 50 skeletons in the Mines and claim it as a reward from The Adventurer’s Guild. 

Shirts 

Most of the clothes that can be tailored are shirts. Though unique shirts exist in the game, many of the combinations will result in a shirt that is named as “Shirt,” and has the same color as the inserted item. 

Pants

There are five different pant styles: Normal-length, Shorts, Dress Bottoms, Skirts, and Genie Pants. Like certain hats, some pants cannot be tailored. For example, Gray Baggy Pants and Gray Relaxed Fit Pants may be dropped by slain Haunted Skulls.

Prismatic Clothing

There are five different prismatic clothing items that can be randomly produced with a Cloth + Prismatic Shard. You can get three different prismatic shirts, prismatic pants, and prismatic genie pants. 

Note: Because the clothing produced is random, you can get duplicates of the same clothes before you obtain them all. 

Check out all the different tailoring combinations on the Stardew Valley Wiki!

Dyeing Clothes

Sewing Machine 

Some clothes can be dyed to a different color; the clothes will be marked as ‘dyeable’ in their clothing description.

To dye clothes using the machine, add the clothing to be dyed in the Feed slot on the left, and add an object in the Spool slot above the power button. On the right panel, you will see the new color of the clothing, so you can preview different colors before confirming the dye job. 

Note: Some clothes can be dyed multiple times to create a richer color. For example, if you want strong shade of red on your white t-shirt, you may need to use a red item a few times on it.

Dye Pots

Unlike the Sewing Machine, Dye Pots cannot be used on your Farm. They are only accessible in Emily and Haley’s house, on the right side of their sewing room. 

Note: You can only use the dye pots to dye the clothes your character is wearing!

Interacting with the pots will pull up the dye menu, which displays your inventory and six color-coded dye pots. You need to place an item with the same or similar color into each pot. For example, you can put an apple in the red pot, but not the blue one. Inventory items that can be placed into a pot have a little circle showing what color dye they produce. 

Once you fill all six pots with items, you’ll receive dye. Clicking on the dye bottle opens up a menu to change the color of an item through hue, saturation, and light sliders.

Footwear Stat Transfer

To transfer the stats of one pair of shoes to the other, place the item with the desired stats on the spool slot in the upper right and place the item to be tailored to the Feed slot in the lower left. The resulting item will be named, “Custom-tailored [Shoe Name].”

Note: The item used in the spool slot will be consumed and destroyed during the process!