Animal Crossing: New Horizons player finds clever way to save custom design slots

Animal Crossing: New Horizons custom designs
(Image credit: Nintendo)

An Animal Crossing: New Horizons player has discovered a revolutionary way to display custom patterns whilst saving custom design slots in their inventory. 

As initially shared in the r/AnimalCrossing subreddit, user u/InBetweenSeen noticed that not only can custom designs be displayed on the floor of your house, but that they can also be rotated into the ideal position. This means that a large design that would usually take up several slots in a player's inventory can now take up a lot fewer by just using the same design and rotating it accordingly. 

I'm not sure how many people are aware of this, but you can rotate custom designs in your house which can potentially save you a few slots (6 in my example). from r/AnimalCrossing

This seemingly small but game-changing discovery didn’t go unnoticed by other Animal Crossing fans, who flocked to the comments to share their reactions to the hack. Some fans didn’t know that you could display patterns in your home at all, whilst the majority voiced how much they wished this was also an outside feature, as this is where a lot of custom designs tend to get used.

The author of the original post did reply to clear this up though stating that: “the difference is that the designs are placed as mats in your house and those can be interacted with like the kitchen mats. So it's actually not something custom designs that are placed as paths "could do"” They did, however, follow up this comment also noting how good it would be if players were able to do the same outside. 

Other players have also used custom designs to their advantage after the Animal Crossing: New Horizons anniversary update launched last week. One fan even found a way to bring pet cats into the game by utilizing the Custom Designer Editor+ to place 3D-looking designs onto umbrellas and displaying them around their home.

For more custom design inspiration, take a look at our best Animal Crossing: New Horizons design codes list.

Hope Bellingham
News Writer

After studying Film Studies and Creative Writing at university, I was lucky enough to land a job as an intern at Player Two PR where I helped to release a number of indie titles. I then got even luckier when I became a Trainee News Writer at 12DOVE before being promoted to a fully-fledged News Writer after a year and a half of training.  My expertise lies in Animal Crossing: New Horizons, cozy indies, and The Last of Us, but especially in the Kingdom Hearts series. I'm also known to write about the odd Korean drama for the Entertainment team every now and then.