The armpit hole:

My game plan for this was to use an iron on patch to close and reinforce the hole and the area surrounding it. Usually I’ll use a patch of a similar material and sew it on with a sewing machine, using the combination of patch and thread to secure and reinforce the hole and surrounding fabric. Here that technique would smush the fur down, and what’s the point of a fur coat if it’s all matted and weird in one spot from all the sewing?

The process:

Step one was taking the coat apart just enough that I could access the tear to actually fix it. The easiest way to do that was partially removing the lining. My number one tip for taking things apart is take more “Before Pictures” than you think you could ever possibly need. Because you will need them. I only took two pictures here, but I had the intact side of the coat to compare to.

The next step was ironing on the patch. Let me tell you: fur smells crazy when you use steam on it. Unfortunately using steam instead of really pressing the iron down is the best way I’ve found to make sure the glue on the patch melts without messing up the fur side of the fur.

Once the patch was ironed on I hand stitched it down for extra security. An iron on patch is better than nothing, but sewing it is better than just ironing it. I used small stitches on the fur side so that they (1) don’t show and (2) don’t get caught on anything. The large passes are on the inside covered by lining so I wasn’t worried about them being ugly or snag-able.

With the patch secure I reattached the lining. I found a matching color thread and hand-tacked the lining in, using the pictures I took and the intact side of the coat for reference.

The end result:

With everything stitched back up, the giant hole was no longer visible and the coat was ready to be wrapped and given to my friend.

Annoyingly, the hat was knit flat then stitched together up the side. This is pretty common in mass produced knit items, but makes it a little harder to recreate the stitches that were pulled out by the pompom falling off. Using a combination of safety pins and a crochet hook I was able to re-knit the unraveled rows and decreases. A needle and thread took care of securely re-attaching the pompom.

The hats both survived the rest of the run and returned safely to storage.

• button repair: $2

• small patch (<2”): $10

• medium patch (2”-5”): $15

• large patch (>5”): $20

• rips along seams: $10

• embroidery (machine) (<4”): $15

• embroidery (machine) (>4”): varies

• embroidery (hand) (<4”): $20

• embroidery (hand) (>4”): varies

Alterations

• shortening hems: $10

• taking in waistbands: $10

Creations

• coming soon :)

As I do more mending and other projects I aim to take more progress photos and write up more detailed posts about techniques and resources. What follows in this post is a round up of repairs I’ve done on my own clothing recently.

First: A simple set of corduroy patches covering and reinforcing holes in a pair of jeans. I removed and then reattached the “P” patch on the left side.

Next up: On the same pair of pants, I added straps and hardware from a pair of sandals I wore out. (Pinky swear I won’t use old shoes on your garments if I’m repairing them. That’s a “working on my own clothes” sort of special.) The straps allow for easy adjustment of the waistband.

You can also see a repair of a small hole beneath one of the beltloops on the right. I removed the bottom of the belt loop, placed a piece of scrap fabric behind the hole, and closed/reinforced the hole using the zigzag stitch on my sewing machine.

One of my favorite repairs is this button up shirt. I got bleach all over it cleaning, so I used machine embroidery to cover up the discolored spots. Two matching leaves went on either end of the collar to pull the whole look together. Please forgive the terrible lighting.

The shell of one of my warmer jackets is a plastic/vinyl situation that cracked around the cuffs, making a bunch of small, sharp holes. Removing the cracked shell, and adding new corduroy cuffs solved the problem comfortably. I looked for a waterproof fabric option, but I would have had to buy something new. The combined desires to Not Do That and also to Finish It Now meant pulling something cute from my scrap buckets.

Next is my favorite pair of shorts: The Adam Sandler Jorts. I thrifted these and they almost immediately started falling apart. The first set of repairs are on the front. Adding panels of floral print cotton, under the carpenter-pant-style reinforcements, covered and further reinforced several tears that had opened up along the top of the panels.

On the back of the shorts, I used a different floral pattern to back and patch a couple holes near the bottom of the pockets, as well as more subtle patches at the top. You can also see the giant rip that finally put the beloved jorts out of commission. One of these days I’m going to take them apart and make a pattern so a new pair of jorts can take over my summer wardrobe.

Is covering an ugly hat you were given as a gift mending? I figure since it kept me from throwing the hat directly in the trash, yes it is. Here’s a hand-painted-onto-scrap-denim-patch that I attached to the hat with embroidery floss and a blanket stitch. Credit to Iron and Resin for the inspiration for the patch.

Last is the repair that I do the most on my own clothes as well as on other people’s clothes. Tears on the inner thigh of pants and shorts. My method here is to place a patch of (ideally color matched) denim on the inside of the pant and zigzag stitch around the edge to secure it. Then, I flip the pants right side out and either zigzag or straight stitch over the tear/frayed area.

When wearing the shorts you can’t see the repair, unless you sit crisscross-applesauce and someone looks directly at it. Since these are my own very old jorts, I didn’t bother matching the denim patch, so you can see it when the shorts are laid out like in the picture below. But I generally don’t sit like that so it wasn’t a concern for me.

View of the shorts from the front, plus a woven mend I did near the zipper.

View of the shorts from the back, plus a visible mend of a hole I ripped near the pocket.

And so we come to the end of a mega post of my recent projects. Stay tuned for theatrical repairs, a ren-faire costume, and hand bound notebooks.

-Natalie