How to turn a pattern into an editable path?

[California Gold]

I made a pattern and saved it as a swatch, I have now made a shape and filled it with that patttern, but it acts like a mask. How can I get that pattern out onto the artboard so that I can edit it with the Shape Builder Tool? Is that possible?

Thanks,

[CarlosCanto]

yeah, drag the swatch out and drop it on to the Artboard. You should be able to edit the paths.

[California Gold]

If I drag the swatch onto the artboard, I only get a single instance of the shape the pattern was made from. I can only seem to use the pattern as a fill within another shape.

[Grant H · Accepted solution]

If you want to edit the shape with the pattern you can (object>expand>check fill and path or as you need)

[California Gold]

Thanks, that seemed to finally get the pattern out of the shape and onto the artboard, but I was hoping to use the Shape Builder Tool next and unfortunately that is not working on the shapes these staps gave me.

Thanks though, you got me past this obstacle, now onto the next one!

[Monika Gause]

Please show screenshots of your issues.

After expanding, there are lots of clipping masks which you need to expand. Then get rid of the masks and only then will you be able to join those shapes.