What is the origin of the idiom cut from the same cloth?

Answer 1

In sewing, fabric is sold by the yard with standard widths, such as 36" or 48". The fabric is folded in half with the outside of the cloth folded to the inside and wound around heavy cardboard bolts. Seamstresses use thin paper patterns to make clothing. When a seamstress lays out a pattern on folded material (with the inside folded out), sometimes it saves fabric to lay pattern pieces on the fold. Other pattern pieces are arranged on the fabric, in whatever ways to make all the pieces "fit" according to the appropriate amount of yardage. To cut from the same cloth refers to the fact you can get all the pieces to make one garment from the same length of material as long as you bought enough yardage. However, it is also possible to have leftover cloth in varying pieces.

Fabric weaving in olden days needed to be woven and dyed (by hand) at the same time or you could have variations of weave or color in the fabric yardage. Also if a woman bought too little and had to go back to buy more yards, the second purchase might not exactly match the first fabric. So it was very important to buy enough yardage at the same time, from the same bolt of fabric, to be sure the weave and dye matches. Today, machinery weaves threads and controls dying, but even today, it's important to know sizes, take measurements, and buy enough yardage in the first purchase.

So in days' past, if you cut a pattern from two separate purchases, you might have noticeable variations in the garment. People could see these differences.

"Cut from the same cloth" means things look very similar or match. This idiom came to be used to describe similarities in people. "He's cut from the same cloth as his father." Depending on the father's reputation, though, this could be meant positively or negatively about father and son. As an idiom, "cut from the same cloth" is similar to saying, "The apple doesn't fall far from the tree"-- which can also be used in a negative or positive way.

Example: A middle-aged man gets drunk all the time, can't hold a job, and doesn't get along with people. His son who is 22-years old begins to act like his father. A neighbor comments, "You know what they say, the apple doesn't fall far from the tree. Another neighbor clucks, and agrees, "Cut from the same cloth, they are!"