Dina Bader: How to get custom designs from Sable in Animal Crossing: New Horizons

She seems cold at first, but you can befriend Sable behind her sewing machine.

As you progress in Animal Crossing: New Horizons, you will meet and befriend the Able sisters. These three hedgehogs are responsible for most of the clothing in the Animal Crossing world. We've already told you how to get the Able Sisters tailor shop on your island and how to win at Label's fashion theme style exercises, but did you know you can also befriend the shyest of the Able sisters too? Sable takes more work to engage than her sisters, but it's definitely worth the effort!

Who is Sable?

The eldest of the three Able sisters, Sable has a surprisingly sad past for such a cheerful game. When Mabel was too young to remember, the Able sisters' parents died in a car crash and Sable took over, raising Mabel and Label. Sable worked hard, and her hard work paid off! She and Mabel were able to open their very own shop, selling most of the clothing you'll ever own in Animal Crossing. Label, on the other hand, took off to learn about fashion around the world and create her own haute couture clothing line.

Despite the success of the Able sisters, Sable is hardly ever seen away from her sewing machine, and she will shoo you away if you try to talk to her. She leaves the customer end of the business up to Mabel, preferring to spend her time sewing their products.

She won't talk to me!

Upon first meeting, Sable will insist that she is too busy to talk to you, eventually asking Mabel to get you out of her spikes. She will continue to brush you aside day after day. Fear not though! It's not because she doesn't like you or even that she is too busy to talk, but rather because she's quite shy. While Mabel excels at customer service and Label is the very public face of her own haute couture fashion line, Sable has very few friends. The most notable of her friends is Tom Nook, who was her best friend, only to have moved far away from the countryside where they grew up together. It takes a lot of consistent effort to earn her trust.

After talking to her every day for several days, however, she will warm up to you. By the sixth day, Sable will even consider you a friend, and she will begin to open up to you about her and her sisters' past. A few days after that she will reward you with a special gift each day! You have to make sure to talk to her every day though. If you miss a day, you might find you've lost some of the progress you made.

What are her rewards?

In addition to being a friend to a prickly hedgehog and learning more about the Able sisters, you will also be rewarded for the time you spend talking to Sable. Once you have befriended her, she will gift you with a set of custom patterns every day. You can use these patterns to customize your furniture. While not every piece of furniture can be customized, many can, and with each set consisting of 20 new patterns, there are hundreds of customization options available. Currently, we know of ten different Sable pattern sets:

Striped
Checkered 1
Checkered 2
Cool
Natural
Polka-dot Print
Retro
Striped
Toys
Traditional 1
Traditional 2

These are all the sets we know of so far, but it's certainly possible Sable will offer more patterns in the future, so make sure you tallk to her every day!

How do I use Sable's patterns?

Once you've been gifted a special pattern, you can use it to customize many different pieces of furniture. Not every piece of furniture can be customized and even fewer can be customized with fabric, but the ones that can can be given a bit of personal flare using Sable's patterns. To customize with Sable's patterns, just follow these easy steps:

With the furniture you want to customize and customization kits, press A to open your D.I.Y. Workbench.
Press A to select **"Customize something."
Press A to select the piece of furniture in your inventory. I went with a Wooden Simple Bed because it's easy to craft and can be customized in both paint color and fabric pattern. However, you will be able to select anything that can be customized at all.
If you want to customize the paint color, press A to select a paint color.
To customize the fabric pattern, press A to select pattern. This will open up a new menu with your patterns.
Press A to select the pattern you want.
Press + to customize.
Press A to select "Yeah."

And tada! You've taken a boring piece of furniture and made it all your own.

Questions?

Do you have any questions about befriending Sable? Have you found a custom pattern set we've missed? Let us know in the comments below, and be sure to check out our many other Animal Crossing: New Horizons guides for all of your Nook approved goodness!