A tech pack is a group effort involving multiple skillsets. It follows a design through product development to production and documents its whole evolution.
The tech pack starts with design. If the design team is creating the sketches, those then become the start of the tech pack. The designer will also assign style names or numbers to each design and maybe provide reference images and a few key callouts as well.
Next, technical design takes over. There is no clear delineation of where design stops and where technical design begins, though. Every brand makes this transition a bit differently. The technical designer will flesh out the technical sketches with additional callouts and add more views or close-up sketches if needed. Technical design fills out most of the remaining tech pack sections including the bill of materials, label placement, colorways, and sometimes starts the graded spec.
The patternmaker is brought in to finish the remaining sections like the cutter’s must, order of operations, and to proof or complete the graded spec chart.
In a larger company, many people are involved in creating a full tech pack. Each of these roles – design, technical design, patternmaker might be whole teams of people. In a smaller brand, it may be just one person doing the tech pack, but that person is filling these multiple roles.
I work both ways with my clients. For larger brands, I double check or fill in the info they need after their teams have done the rest. For smaller brands and start ups, I offer start to finish tech pack services that include each of these steps and tech pack sections. You can learn more about my tech pack services here or reply to this email to get your designs on my schedule for the New Year.