Are you on the hunt for a new place to source your fabrics for cosplay? Bummed out that Fabric.com is gone, lost on where to find materials with robust color options, or looking for a less expensive alternative to Mood fabrics? You are in luck, my friend! I’ve compiled a list of great fabric retailers you might not have stumbled upon yet. Read on!
FabScrap
For the environmentally conscious cosplayer, FabScrap sells fabrics recovered from over 700 fashion businesses & high-end designers in New York City. This is a great place to check first to see if the material you need for a project is available before looking at other retailers! Additionally, they take and recycle fabric scraps from crafters in the Brooklyn or Philly areas. (I’ll include more info on fabric recycling at the end of this list, BTW!)
This retailer ships from the East Coast of the USA.
Fabric Wholesale Direct
Thanks to many cosplayers (myself included), you may have heard of this one before, but it is worth mentioning again! Fabric Wholesale Direct sells a large selection of fabrics for low prices and offers additional volume discounts. I get much of my material for my pattern business from this store because the prices are hard to beat!
This retailer ships from the East Coast of the USA.
Fashion Fabrics Club
Fashion Fabrics Club is another online fabric retailer with a large variety of fabrics by the yard at wholesale prices. The apparel fabrics offerings are excellent, and the section for fabric remnants is worth a peek at. If you are into leatherworking, this site also has a robust selection of hides! Something that separates this seller from others is that their minimum cut length is 1/4 of a yard, and fabrics can be ordered in 1/4 yard increments rather than by the yard.
This retailer ships from the West Coast or the Midwest of the USA.
Denver Fabrics
Denver Fabrics is nearly identical to Fashion Fabrics Club and owned by the same company. The selection of fabrics is essentially the same, but I felt this second site was worth a mention.
This retailer ships from the West Coast or the Midwest of the USA.
Fabric LA
Fabric LA is an online store from Los Angeles (hence the name.) This site should be on every cosplayer’s radar for their Foil Spandex fabrics, available in much sought-after gold and silver! They have an excellent selection of solid-color knits and woven fashion fabrics at affordable prices.
This retailer ships from the West Coast of the USA.
Minerva
The color selection for fashion fabrics on this site is second to none! Finding solid color wovens and knits in just about any hue you need from this retailer is straightforward. They also have an excellent site sorting function that rivals the now-extinct fabric.com. The ‘Minerva Core Range’ is a store-brand fabric line that includes a robust selection of solid color basics like poplin, satin, linings, and jersey knits.
This retailer ships from the United Kingdom.
Spoonflower
You may have heard of Spoonflower before, and for a good reason! It is the premier sublimation printing retailer for fabrics in the USA if you need custom-printed fabric made. You can choose from designs others have uploaded to the site or make & print your own! There are numerous fabric options to choose from, and they allow for rush orders (which has saved me in a pinch before!) I recommend ordering fabric samples and a printed color chart from them before finalizing your fabric order because sublimation printed colors can differ significantly from how they appear on a computer screen.
This retailer ships from the East Coast of the USA.
Art Of Where
Art of Where is another sublimation printing company that, like Spoonflower, offers custom-printed fabrics. In addition to carrying various fabric types to print on, you can order clothing items like custom-printed leggings on this site!
This retailer ships from Montreal, Canada.
SwatchOn
If you run a small business that needs fabric, it is worth applying to get access to the expansive catalog of materials available at SwatchOn! SwatchOn is an incredible resource for finding unique and hard-to-find fashion fabrics. If you need it, this place has it! They exclusively sell to businesses, so this retailer requires you to have an established company with an EIN to buy from them. (Note: Sole Proprietors can apply for EINs!) Orders have a MOQ (minimum order quantity) of 3 yards per fabric.
This retailer ships from Seoul, Korea.
Wawak
While not a fabric retailer, Wawak is always worth a mention due to its prices on every kind of notion or sewing tool you can think of! For example, 1000-yard Gutermann thread spools go for less than $5 and are available in more than 400 colors! Snaps, zippers, elastic, thread, needles, interfacing, grommets- Wawak carries all the basics you need to complete your costume for much less than you’ll pay elsewhere. I recommend requesting a catalog from them to keep on hand when you need to order thread. Their catalog includes color charts for numerous brands of thread and notions!
This retailer ships from both the East and West Coasts of the USA.
As promised, here’s a little bit of info about recycling your fabric scraps:
Many charity shops and some clothing retailers in the USA accept bags of fabric remnants- synthetic and organic fibers alike. These businesses deal in large volumes of textiles regularly, and not all of those can go on to be sold. Rather than send it all to a landfill, they are sent to recycling facilities to be shredded and turned into useful materials like carpet padding and the filling in car seats. Neat, right?
I collect and drop my fabric remnants off at my closest charity shop. If you can save your scraps and live in the US, I recommend participating in this recycling process!
Read more on recycling fabric here: https://www.smartasn.org/where-to-recycle/
That’s it for now! Hopefully, this list has given you a few new online fabric stores to check out & more places to source your fabrics for cosplay.
Happy crafting!