You could use a colour wheel to make sure the colours suit one another. You could ask for opinions. You could make the patterns and their matching colours originally.
What I would do personally would be to find a colour wheel and choose colours for a shirt/skirt/etc depending on what design the garment was and the shape and size. For example, if it were a mini skirt, I would more than likely choose a solid colour. If it were a longer skirt with - say - polka dots, I would choose two colours that compliment one another like blue and orange, or green and red.
