Creating your own repeating seamless pattern tool is simple and this pattern tool can be used time and time again. For the sake of this tutorial, I will choose the dimensions — feel free to alter these to suit your pattern design specifications.

Buy my ready to use Inkscape seamless pattern templates £6 Simple installation instructions included.

Buy the complete set of assets used in this tutorial £37 These can be used in your own patterns.

In this post I will go over the basics of creating a seamless pattern grid in Inkscape and exporting instructions, then I’ll follow with how to adapt the pattern grid instructions to suit a number of different pattern styles.

How to create a pattern grid

This guide will take you through the basics as all the pattern styles use a similar method. Any necessary variations in method will be mentioned under each style later in this post.

1. Set Inkscape document properties (for all patterns)

Open Inkscape and go to File > Document Properties. Set (both) your units to px, your page dimensions to 500px x 500px and your scale to 1. The page is used to export the final tile.

2. Place a square in the middle of the page

With the rectangle tool, draw a square (hold ctrl to restrain aspect ratio) that is 250px x 250px (without a stroke). Then, with the “Align and distribute” panel (found in the object menu) set the square to the centre of the page, both horizontally and vertically. Select the square in the Objects panel and, in the Fill and stroke panel, change the fill to white and the alpha to 1%. Then change the stroke to grey (hide this triangle before exporting the final design).

3. Create a group

With the square selected, press ctrl+g to create a group. In the Objects panel, rename the group “main”, for your reference.

4. Clone the group

Select the group, and press alt+d to clone it.

5. Snap the clone to the side of the first square

Make sure snapping is on, and, to the right of your first square, snap the newly created clone.

6. Continue cloning and snapping around the square

Add a stroke to the square inside the “main” group (shift click a colour on the colour palette). Keep cloning the original group and keep snapping the squares around your first shape — it is important to create enough clones to go well beyond the boundaries of your page in case you want your patterns to spill out and overlap. You may find this step easier with the page border above your artwork. Go to File > Document Properties > Border on top of drawing.

7. Tidy up your template for use

To make your template usable, in the fill and stroke panel, change the fill colour of your original shape to white with an alpha (opacity) of 1% (this means you can still select it, but is near transparent). Then, add a stroke of black or grey.

Duplicate your shape and place it on a new layer. Change the fill colour to a light grey, remove the stroke and send the layer to the bottom so it sits as a guide under your grid.

Using the Objects panel, name your layers and groups logically. You will want to hide both your first shape and your guide layer before exporting to png.

8. Start working within the “main” group

Select the main group, then press ctrl+enter. You are now within the group and any artwork you create will be replicated within the clones.

9. Exporting your tile

To export your tile, go to File > Export to png and select page. Set your destination and then click export.

Troubleshooting

If your artwork is not repeated, check in the Objects panel that you are working within the “main” group. Also, all of your clones should have the name “use…”

Adapting this method to various pattern styles

Assuming you have accomplished the grid above, I will now go over some popular repeating pattern styles and how to achieve them in Inkscape.

Create a full drop seamless pattern

The full-drop or block style is a perfect fit for the method described above — no alterations needed. This graphic was created by lining up my animal assets and creating a 4x4 grid featuring the same animals with colour variations. This became the block which is then repeated. Colour variations help to distract your eyes from the repeat. The only tricky part is creating uniform (looking) white space — a little trial and error was needed.

Create a half-drop seamless pattern

While very similar to the described method, in the half-drop pattern, every second column is offset 125px on the Y axis, as shown below. For this pattern, I decided to overflow the edges of the box to create a slight overlap.

Create an alternating half-drop pattern variation

The pattern below was created by (individually) horizontally flipping the clones on every second line. Once flipped, the elements in the “main” group were adjusted slightly to improve the appearance.

Create a diamond shaped seamless pattern

The main difference to the block repeat style is you need to rotate your main square to create a diamond. Once rotated, its dimensions should be 250px x 250px (no stroke) and it should be aligned to the centre of the page, both horizontally and vertically.

Use the cloning method above to create a grid that looks like the image below.

Create an Ogee seamless pattern

The Ogee pattern grid is a little more involved, so I have diagramed the stages below.

With the rectangle tool, draw a square. Then, snap a duplicate square to the top and the bottom of the first square. Turn on snapping, then take the bezier pen and create a zig-zag line from the top left corner. Select the line with the “Edit paths by nodes” tool, then select all the nodes on the line (ctrl+a) and click the “Make selected nodes symmetrical” button on the top toolbar. Click away from the graphic once, and then highlight the middle two nodes on the line. Now, click the “Break path at selected nodes” button.

Go to Paths > Break apart and your line should be split into 3.

Keep the middle section of the line and delete the other two and the squares. Duplicate the line (ctrl+d) and flip the line horizontally with the “h” key, then snap it to the right to create a mirror image.

Highlight both paths, duplicate them, and flip them with the “v” key. Now, snap them to the bottom of your first two lines. With all the lines selected, go to the “edit paths by nodes” tool, select all the nodes (ctrl+a) and click the “Join path at selected nodes” button on the top toolbar.

Now you have a complete shape, change the fill colour (any colour). With your shape selected (main selection tool), group it (ctrl+g) and create a clone of the group (alt-d).

Snap your clone flush to the side of the first shape.

Continue to clone the first shape and place the clones around the object until yours looks like the graphic below. Now give the main shape a dark coloured stroke and change the fill to white with an opacity (alpha) of 1% — this means you’ll barely see the fill but you can still select it. Here is a stegosaurus design I created using the ogee seamless pattern template. For this design, I decided to rotate the tile 90 degrees. Return to the top of the page for exporting instructions.

Create reflecting seamless patterns

There are various types of reflecting patterns.

To create something similar to the graphic above, you will need the following grid. Using the method at the top of the page, create a 4x4 grid of cloned squares — place your main square group where the grey square is pictured in the grid below. This time the whole grid will be within the page borders, so group your grid and resize to 500px x 500px (no stroke), then with the Align and Distribute panel, centre your grid on the page and ungroup it again. Add an arrow to your main group like the one shown in the grey square below and flip your clone squares until it matches what you see in the grid. Place your graphic in the main square group and your artwork will be reflected. Return to the instructions above to export.

Create Damask patterns

While damask isn’t technically a pattern style (it’s a fabric from Damascus) there is a distinctive pattern style which is closely associated with it.

While the layout is relatively simple — the artwork will take a little practise to master. I soon plan to do a tutorial covering Damask style illustration, so if this interests you, subscribe at the top for email updates.

To create a template to work from, do the following:

Start with a diamond (a tilted square — click it twice, hold ctrl and rotate until the point is at the top) in the centre of your 500px x 500px page, as with the diamond pattern above. The diamond should measure 250px x 250px (no stroke).

Convert the diamond to paths — Select the shape then go to Path > Object to path)

Now, cut it in half vertically. You can do this with the node tool. Click the right-hand node and press delete, then select the top and bottom nodes and click “Make selected nodes corner” button on the top toolbar. Now, with the triangle selected, group the triangle, then clone the group (alt+d) reflect it (h) and snap it to the right to make a diamond shape again.

Select the left triangle in the Objects panel and, in the Fill and stroke panel, change the fill to white and the alpha to 1%. Then change the stroke to grey (hide this triangle before exporting the final design).

Select the whole diamond and group it. Now, begin cloning it and create a grid as described at the top of the post and shown below. Once you have the grid, place your artwork into the left triangle group — clicking the central diamond, press ctrl+enter to enter the group then do this once more on the triangle — your artwork will be reflected on the right and cloned throughout the grid.