8 Best Online Fashion Designing Courses & Certifications [Updated June 2023]

Best Online Fashion Designing Courses

 

Do you love to follow Vogue? Do you have names of popular designers on your fingertips? Does the fashionista in you love to dress up or experiment with fabrics, colors, patterns, and styles?  We take your answers to these questions as a YES since you were already searching for online fashion designing courses with certificate to learn fashion designing online that brought you to us.

 

Fashion designing is a form of art that allows one to express his/her personality through the medium of clothes and accessories. It can be a really fulfilling experience for the creative minds to learn from the best online fashion design courses, especially for those who love to follow fashion trends, have a flair for sketching, and wish to create something new. It is gratifying to see your idea transform into something that people love and admire. Fashion designing as a career option also allows you to be your own boss and with time and effort you can launch your own brand.

 

Some of the other perks include the liberty to follow your passion, traveling to seek inspiration from people, places, nature, etc., meeting like-minded people who can inspire you and help you achieve your fashion dream, and so on. Also being in the fashion industry doesn’t necessarily mean that you need to be a fashion designer. You can also work in the fashion industry as a merchandiser, brand manager, makeup artist, stylist, fashion consultant, fashion model, or a fashion journalist. These are some of the popular profiles that pay pretty well.

 

However, all of this begins when you learn and understand the fundamentals of fashion designing and how the fashion industry operates. Now you need not necessarily own a bachelor’s degree to follow your passion in vogue. You can also learn fashion designing online.  Online learning has gained traction in recent times and the fashion industry too is keeping up. Almost every online learning portal is offering some really exciting online fashion designing courses with certificate that you can use to showcase your skills.

 

To help you begin, TrumpLearning along with 11 fashion industry experts have created a list of best online fashion design courses offered by highly experienced professionals and institutes. Continue reading to understand how you can learn fashion designing online with the help of these courses.

 

8 Best Courses to Learn Fashion Designing Online:

  1. Pattern Making for Fashion Design – Beginner Course (Part 1) [Udemy]
  2. Sketching for Fashion Design – Beginner Course [Udemy]
  3. How to Create a Fashion Collection and Launch Your Own Brand [Udemy]
  4. Fashion as Design By MoMA [Coursera]
  5. Designing and Creating Skirts By Hong Kong Polytechnic University [edX]
  6. Fashion Design – Start to Finish [Creative Live]
  7. Pattern Cutting & Making for Absolute Beginners – Fashion [Udemy]
  8. Marc Jacobs Teaches Fashion Design [Masterclass]
Pattern Making for Fashion Design – Beginner Course (Part 1) [Udemy]

 

To begin with, the first course in our list of best online fashion design courses is the introductory Udemy fashion design course.  If you plan to work in the fashion industry in the future, it is essential to know all the technical terms, techniques, and principles so that the communication flows smoothly right from conceptualization till production.

 

The focus area of this online fashion designing course with certificate is to teach you the techniques of pattern making aka fashion drafting.  Pattern making is a specialized skill that requires accuracy, precision, and detail. If you possess these qualities, a career in pattern making can be very rewarding. The demand and compensations for a sound pattern drafter are quite high in the fashion industry. Also, while the garment is in production and if there is any technical glitch due to the pattern, having the right knowledge will facilitate you in quickly rectifying the problem.

 

Under this online fashion designing course, you will learn how to cut patterns, use these patterns to cut fabrics, and finally sew it together to create the garment. This online fashion design course for beginners is divided into seven sessions that contain 42 minutes of on-demand video lectures. The key concepts and techniques covered in this online fashion designing course with certificate are:

 

  • Dart manipulation and added fullness and contour
  • Techniques such as pivoting and slash-and-spread
  • New terminologies such as slopers, blocks and darts, pleats, tucks, yokes, princess seams, shirring, apex, and notches
  • Where patterns come from: draping muslin bodice on a dress form
  • Drafting princess seams
  • Drafting an A-line skirt
  • Drafting skirt yokes and adding fullness to a skirt
  • Grain lines and pattern labeling
  • Trueing darts
  • Tools necessary for drafting patterns

 

The instructor of this Udemy fashion design course is Nino Via, a fashion design instructor, an expert fashion consultant, and creator of some of the best online fashion design courses.  While there are no prerequisites to enroll for this course, you must, however, have a keen interest in fashion designing and the willingness to learn how to draft patterns. This Udemy fashion design course has been tagged as a bestseller and has a rating of 4.2 with 2682 students already enrolled. You can enroll for this course by paying a one-time fee that also comes with a 30-days money-back guarantee. Purchasing this course will give you full lifetime access to the course content. The online video classes can be easily accessed on a mobile or TV. You will also be granted a certificate of completion at the end of this online fashion designing course.

 

Reviews by Srivalli Gunishetti
This is the best beginners course if you wish to get an idea what actually fashion designing course is, and you gain knowledge of many basics in this course at an affordable price. The teaching is also very good, it is very clear. It is a very rare case that you get doubts.

 


Sketching for Fashion Design – Beginner Course [Udemy]

 

Sketching forms the very base of your garment design as it is the first point of conception. It is from here that your fashion idea translates into an actual garment; therefore it is essential to opt for best online fashion design courses to know the right techniques to sketch if you plan to learn fashion designing online. This beginner’s online fashion designing course will take you through a step-by-step process of creating an industry-standard 9-heads croqui.

 

This online fashion designing course with certificate consists of seven sections that contain seven lessons. The entire course can be taken up in just half an hour, making it one of the best fashion design courses to learn sketching techniques quickly. The skills that you will acquire by taking this online fashion designing course are:

 

  • Sketching a ‘9-Head Croqui’
  • Using a croqui as a template to start sketching fashion ideas
  • Drawing body movement and creating an ‘S’ shaped silhouette
  • Balancing the body and using the plumb Line
  • Exercises to learn shading and coloring
  • Pencil techniques to create ‘shirring/gathers’
  • Creating a ‘fashion journal’ to use as a source of inspiration
  • Differentiating garment closure between men's wear and women's wear

 

This online fashion designing course with certificate is also created by Nino Via, a fashion design instructor, and creator of the first Udemy fashion design course in our list of best online courses for fashion design.  Since this is a beginners’ course it is fit for high school juniors as well as for college and working individuals who wish to learn to sketch for fashion designing. You can purchase this course by paying a one-time online fee.

 

The fee is also covered with a 30-days money-back guarantee if you are not satisfied with the content of this online fashion designing course. This Udemy fashion design course has a rating of 4.4 and has 1952 students on board to learn fashion designing online. This course will give you a certificate on completion and full lifetime access to the video lessons.

 

Reviews by Gean Boegman
It is very good for beginners ,super happy I watched it although it is a little basic but again it is for beginners. Further it is a good coarse and helped me a lot.

 


How to Create a Fashion Collection and Launch Your Own Brand [Udemy]

 

While the previous two of the best online fashion design courses on Udemy focused on the techniques and fundamentals of fashion designing, this particular course, designed by the same instructor Nino Via, will help you bring it all together to create your own fashion line.  The instructor will take you step-by-step through the entire process to learn fashion designing online, starting from inspiration for your design, putting your ideas on paper, learning the manufacturing process, to using social media to promote and launch your brand.

 

This beginner’s Udemy fashion design course is fit for anyone who is enthusiastic about fashion designing and aspires to work for the glamorous industry in the future. The duration of this online fashion designing course is approx. 40 minutes and the lessons have been divided into eight sections.

 

By taking this online fashion designing course with certificate, you will learn:

 

  • New terminology such as slopers, mood boards
  • Basic sketching techniques to translate your ideas on paper
  • Different shapes of garments and ‘silhouettes’
  • Different types of textiles and fabrics such as woven vs. knits
  • The infinite shades of a color
  • Methods and techniques to create a garment such as draping and pattern drafting
  • Sizing and grading as part of the production process
  • Introduction to terms like cost sheets and tech packs
  • The process to identify your target customer
  • Using social media for promoting and selling your fashion line/brand

 

While you learn fashion designing online and understand the different stages of producing a fashion line you will also discover the right channels to enter into the fashion industry. This is one of the best online courses for fashion designing that will help you decide which stage of the fashion line creation is best suited for you as a career choice, whether it is designing, manufacturing, distribution, or social media and marketing.

 

This online fashion designing course with certificate has a rating of 4.4 and 1503 enrollments. You can enroll in this online fashion designing class by paying a one-time fee. You will also be granted full lifetime access to the course content.

 

Reviews by Urooj Ibrar
Hey, I am glad and confident on my decision of taking this course. I learned a lot from it about launching a collection/brand. Respected Ninovia explained everything with necessary depth. I am so happy.

 


Fashion as Design By MoMA [Coursera]

 

Another one in the list of online fashion design courses for beginners, this Coursera fashion design course aims to help you develop critical tools to appreciate and contextualize fashion design. It does so by focusing on a selection of more than 70 garments and accessories from around the world that range from your everyday clothing to the couture garments.

 

This Coursera fashion design course also explains that, just like any other object of design, fashion too thrives between form and function, automation and craftsmanship, standardization and customization, universality and self-expression, and pragmatism and utopian vision. By taking up the Coursera fashion design classes to learn fashion designing online you will gain an understanding of fashion through different perspectives.

 

Counted amongst the best online fashion design courses, this Coursera fashion design course, offered by the Museum of Modern Art, will expose you to the thought process and perspectives of an array of designers, makers, historians, and others working in fashion designing. With the help of studio visits, interviews, and other resources, the Coursera fashion design classes will also introduce you to the history and development of each garment and their changing uses, meanings, and impact over time.

 

This Coursera fashion design course has been divided into seven modules spread across seven weeks. It will take approx. 18 months to complete this online fashion designing course with certificate.

 

To give you an outline, mentioned below are the main objectives covered in this Coursera fashion design training:

 

  • Tracing the history, development, and impact of garments over time in different contexts
  • Exploring how the garments have been reinvented to stay relevant with time
  • Investigating how the evolution of fashion has had social, economic, political, and environmental consequences.
  • Understanding the lifecycle of clothing, starting from its design to production, marketing, distribution, and consumption.
  • The reasons for the fashion choices with respect to the visual language of dress, individual and collective identities, and global issues such as labor practices, sustainability, and body politics.

 

The instructors of this Coursera fashion design course are curators and research assistant from the Department of Architecture and Design at the Museum of Modern Art. This is an enrollment-based course for which you can also avail of financial aid. This is one of the best online fashion design courses enrolled by 205,686 students and has earned a rating of 4.8 on Coursera. You will also be granted a certificate after completing all the video lectures, readings, and quizzes included in this online fashion designing course.

 

Reviews by MP
Excellent. I thoroughly enjoyed it and recommended it to many. I am a mature student ( 55) and after this, I really feel I want to study a masters in fashion sustainability. Thanks for inspiring me.

 


Designing and Creating Skirts By Hong Kong Polytechnic University [edX]

 

Popular portal edX is also offering a number of online fashion design courses for beginners. This edX fashion design course aims at teaching its student how to create made-to-measure garments and designing a piece of clothing by taking body measurements. The students enrolled to learn fashion designing online in this course will design and create their own unique designs with the help of construction and style adaptations of skirts.

 

One of the best online fashion design courses, this edX fashion design course is a part of a professional certificate in Fashion Design and Creation that includes another course – Designing and Creating Trousers.  Attending the edX fashion design classes will give you a solid foundation of core skills to take up an undergraduate program or pursue a career in the fashion industry as a designer, pattern drafter, merchandizer, or a fitting technician. The skills acquired in this online fashion designing course with certificate will make you industry-ready.

 

The duration of this edX fashion design course is five weeks and will require you to commit 3-5 hours per week. The topics covered in this self-paced online fashion designing course are:

 

Week 1
  • Learn to record body measurements used to create skirts

 

Week 2
  • Create a skirt block made from measurements
  • Sewing a fitting sample
  • Completing a fit analysis

 

Week 3
  • Developing skirt adaptations
  • Creating different waistbands, pockets, openings, pleats, widths, and fullness
  • Learn about fabrics that work for fashion garments

 

Week 4 and 5
  • Introduction to the history of designer skirts
  • Developing the skills to design a unique range of skirts using a template
  • Taking a skirt design and completing the industry specification sheet for production
  • Creating a skirt pattern and sewing a finished sample

 

The instructors of these edX fashion design classes are from the Honk Kong Polytechnic University and the Polimoda Institute. While this course can be enrolled for free, the free version does not include graded assignments and unlimited access to the course content. You can pay a one-time fee to transform this course into an online fashion designing course with certificate. The certificate thus received will be signed by the instructors of the course along with the institution’s logo. This course has been subscribed to by 11,934 students already.

 


Fashion Design – Start to Finish [Creative Live]

 

Whether you are an aspiring fashion designer or someone simply curious to understand the whole process of designing, this is one of the best online courses for fashion designing enthusiasts to learn fashion designing online. This course comes under the online fashion design courses for beginners where you will learn the entire designing process of a garment beginning from the conception of the idea to marketing it.

 

This online fashion designing training consists of 11 hours of video content divided into 47 lessons. The instructor of the course will take you step-by-step through the three phases of fashion designing:

 

Phase 1 – Research, mood boards, collections, and trends Phase 2 – Sketching, draping, pattern making, and construction Phase 3 – Branding, marketing, and industry positioning

 

The creator of this course is Jay Calderin, Director of Creative Marketing, and an instructor at the School of Fashion Design. He is also the founder and executive director of the Boston Fashion Week and the author of three top-selling books on Fashion Design. You can enroll for this course by either paying the entire fee or subscribing to the creator pass of Creative Live. You will get lifetime access to the course content. This online fashion designing course has been enrolled by 4600 students to date. This course, however, does not grant a certificate of completion.

 

Reviews by Charlisha Grandberry
VERY informative class. For me I wish the constructing of garments portion of the course was an actual sewing demo. Even if it was simple as sewing two pieces together or finishing a basic hem. I would have rather spent more time on this section than talking about the details of the runway sections. However, he broke down the sketching a figure and define silhouette section extremely well! i had been having a difficult time with the 8 and 9 head figure method and that section alone is worth the money for the course. I would recommend this course for any independent fashion designer.

 


Pattern Cutting & Making for Absolute Beginners – Fashion [Udemy]

 

Pattern cutting and making is a fundamental key skill in fashion designing. This Udemy fashion designing course is for those of you looking for an online fashion designing course with certificate to learn the fundamentals of paper cutting and making. This is one of the online fashion design courses for beginners enrolled mostly by fashion designing students, industry professionals, aspiring home dressmakers, pattern makers, pattern cutters, and fashion enthusiasts.

 

This online fashion designing course with certificate consists of 1.5 hours of video content that has been divided into four sections and 11 videos. Here is a breakup of the online fashion designing classes that you will undertake in this course:

 

Module 1 – The Basics
  • Tools and equipment
  • Basic Measurements
  • Understanding  blocks and slopers

 

Module 2 – Let’s Start Making a Garment
  • Creating a basic bodice pattern
  • Pattern labeling, seam allowances & cutting instructions
  • Dart manipulation - underarm dart

 

Module 3 – Dress Construction
  • Necklines - V neck bodice
  • Seams and style lines - princess line bodice
  • Basic shift dress
  • Basic pencil skirt

 

The instructor of these online fashion designing classes is Caroline Barulis, a creative pattern cutter who specializes in draping and modeling. This is one of the best online courses for fashion designing with a rating of 4.2 and 8949 students on board. You can avail of this course by paying a one-time fee online that will give lifetime access to the course content. This course is also secured with a 30-days money-back guarantee by Udemy. This is an online fashion designing course with certificate.

 

Reviews by Dr Monika Modak Dass
The course is good...no doubt...however, for a complete beginner, I found it a little more advanced than I could manage! I felt a step-by-step instructive programme would have worked better for me!

 


Marc Jacobs Teaches Fashion Design [Masterclass]

 

“Fashion is not an art, but part of the art of living”. – Marc Jacobs

 

We wanted to end it with a bang and what else could be better than to learn fashion designing online from one of the most famous personalities in the fashion industry – Marc Jacobs.

 

This is truly on the best online courses for fashion designing one could ask for. Under his first-ever masterclass, you will learn the process of creating clothes that challenge the conventional, push boundaries, and set trends. This is one of the best online fashion designing courses as you will learn the construction techniques directly from the horse’s mouth.  By taking up this online fashion designing course you will understand his thought process for creating unique shapes and silhouettes.

 

This course consists of 18 online fashion designing classes in which Marc Jacobs will guide you in developing your own design ideas, and assist you step-by-step starting from the first sketch to the final finished garment. Some of the topics covered in this online fashion designing training are:

 

  • Finding inspiration
  • Sketching your ideas
  • The creative process of design
  • Choosing fabrics
  • Creating shapes and silhouettes
  • Patterns and muslins
  • Developing a collection
  • Working with a team and collaboration
  • Runway shows
  • Surviving the fashion industry
  • Marc’s journey

 

The duration of this online fashion designing course is 4 hours 37 minutes. This is one of the subscription-based online fashion designing courses for beginners available on Masterclass. However, you will not be awarded any certificate on completing this online fashion design masterclass.

 


Conclusion

With that, we wrap up our bundle of the best online courses for fashion designing. For those of you who were apprehensive about where to learn fashion designing online, we hope that our list of online fashion designing courses for beginners will give you a head start. Also, while these courses may help you learn fashion designing online, they cannot substitute for the efforts that you will have to put from your end, apart from learning the skills.

 

Once you complete any of these online fashion design courses for beginners, invest some time in networking with like-minded people and professionals already working in the fashion industry. Since, fashion designing is a vast field it also includes designing jewelry, shoes, sportswear, accessories, etc., take time to decide your niche and search for the best online courses for fashion designing for acquiring the advanced skills of that genre. Meet people running their own brands to understand the process for running a business.

 

Fashion design is a fiercely competitive market but also has amazing job avenues if you are good at what you do. We at TrumpLearning wish you all the best in your endeavor of becoming a successful fashion designer and sincerely hope that we were able to provide you great options for the best online fashion design courses online.

 

Best Online Fashion Designing Courses Reviewed by 11 Fashion Industry Experts 4.5
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