My first (sort of) foray into visible mending

When Brian's jeans wear out, it's generally the knees that go first. Years ago, I discovered I could deal with that problem by sewing a pocket from an old pair of jeans over the ripped area. At this point, most of Brian's jeans have such a patch over at least one knee.

With this technique, I'm able to keep the jeans in service long enough for them to start wearing out in a different area: the back pockets themselves. Specifically, the left back pocket, where he keeps his wallet. Apparently the friction of the wallet against the fabric, particularly as it's inserted and removed, is sufficient to wear little holes into the material. They're not usually big enough for things to slip through, but they're unsightly.

This week, it occurred to me that maybe these smallish holes would be good candidates for visible mending. While conventional mending aims to keep the patched or darned area as inconspicuous as possible, visible mending takes just the opposite approach, turning it into a decorative feature. There are several methods for doing this, including:

• Patching with one or more contrasting fabrics.
• Darning with one or more contrasting colors of thread or yarn.
• Applying a plain patch and then covering it with decorative top-stitching.
• Embroidering directly over a small hole.

Technically, my pocket patch technique is itself a form of visible mending, since it turns the patch into a feature rather than attempting to disguise it. But for these holes in the pockets, I thought I could attempt something a little more visible. Any repair in such a prominent area was bound to be noticeable anyway, so I thought I might as well make it look intentional. 

The hole I planned to tackle was on the larger side—large enough to poke a finger through, anyway—so I thought it would require a patch rather than a darn. But what to use for a patch? I habitually save worn-out jeans and trousers, but the material from those is pretty plain, not vivid enough to make an interesting contrast. I was also concerned about my ability to make a neat-looking patch. To keep it from fraying, I'd probably have to hem it, and anything hemmed by hand (the only way I can do it) is liable to come out looking a bit lumpy. 

I thought maybe a piece of wide ribbon would work, so I started going through our collection of gift wrappings, and there I happened upon a little Christmas stocking ornament that Brian had received years ago as a gift. It was made of red felt, with a burlap section at the top embroidered with Brian's name. Since we never have a full-size Christmas tree ourselves (they're not really compatible with adventurous cats), we didn't have a place to hang it, so it had just been sitting in amongst our wrapping materials. Could this make a reasonable decorative patch?

I decided there was only one way to find out, so I snipped off the top section, trimmed its edges, and started whip-stitching it onto the damaged pocket. Since the idea was for the repair to be visible, I used a cheery red thread that matched the flannel. The loose ends of the burlap poked out a bit, but I was able to tack them into place with some extra stitches. 

So now, Brian owns a pair of jeans that are (a tad ironically) monogrammed on the butt. It remains to be seen how well this patch will hold up in the wash; since I didn't follow the standard advice to use a type of fabric similar to the original garment, it's possible the material will end up fraying or puckering. But if it does, it shouldn't be too hard to pick out the stitching and replace the patch with something more suitable.

Of course, no sooner had I finished making this repair to the pocket than Brian discovered the other knee of the jeans—the one that wasn't already sporting a pocket patch—was starting to fray, so I had to patch that as well. On top of that, there was another worn area, higher up on the thigh, which I couldn't easily repair. So it's possible the jeans themselves won't last long enough for the patch to wear out. On the other hand, it's also possible that if this repair does work out, I could expand my visible mending techniques to other areas of the jeans as well.

I'd like to attempt a darning-style repair next, possibly on the other pair of Brian's jeans that currently has a damaged pocket. However, it appears that to make this look good, I'd need either embroidery floss or tapestry thread, as regular sewing thread is too thin to show up well. So this experiment may need to wait until I can get myself to a fabric store and pick up some additional supplies to play with.

 

[UPDATE, 3/19/24: As it turns out, my fear that this little burlap patch wouldn't stand up well to washing was too optimistic. It didn't even make it to its first washing before it began to fray around the edges. It was only the burlap that was damaged, not the underlying felt, but when removed the burlap, the plain red felt patch looked kind of silly by itself. So I removed that too and went hunting around for something better to replace it. 

After searching all the rag bins without success, my eye hit on an old flannel shirt of mine that I'd been keeping downstairs in the laundry room. It was already torn in a couple of places, so I'd relegated it to grubby-job duty. But it had plenty of good fabric on it, and after a little examination, I spotted a section that looked like it would make a perfect ready-made patch: the flap on one of the front pockets. I carefully snipped it off, sewed the little buttonhole closed, and then stitched it in place over the entire bottom of the damaged jeans pocket.

I think this new flannel patch looks much nicer than the previous one, and I believe it will hold up better too. And Brian loves it.]