Maybe there is a reason why they are not available as such already, I would be very interested to hear this reason. (if there is one) And if there is a way to buy patterns from you as img files I would be very pleased to here so.

(sorry for bad english, 3rd language for me)

Unfortunately, CS3 files only work in CS2 if they are saved separately as a special legacy version on my end. I’ve gone ahead and done this for the elegant swirls pattern, so try redownloading the pattern file and open the one ending in “cs2.ai”. As a solution to other downloads, all of our more recent patterns include a tileable, seamless, and lossless .png of the pattern. You can open this in Illustrator and define it as a swatch without even using the live trace option, then use it the same way you’d use any other pattern–since it’s a png it’ll define the white space as a transparency. You’ll want to play around with blending/layers or the magic wand tool to change the color.

Another option–it’s not always spot on, but you can also open the png in Illustrator and use the “Live trace” function to create an editable pattern, although I’d opt for the former solution.