I don’t know if you know about #underconsumptioncore, but I’ve been living this long before it became a hashtag. I just discovered it this week, and I’m pleasantly surprised it’s all about using what you already have before you go out and buy more. I think mending falls under this category well. When you can mend your clothes, you don’t have to go out and buy new ones. I also like to keep my old favorite clothes even if I can’t wear them anymore, because one day, I want to clone them all.
However, I’m actually new to mending. I taught myself how to handsew last year, which was a very helpful skill to pick up before taking on the sewing machine.
And it’s never too late to learn something new.
My friend asked if I could mend his biking gloves since they were still too good to throw out. It had very obvious tears at the tip of the pointer fingers, which is not good when you’re biking.
I accepted so that I could give it a shot. Even though I know there are some specific mending techniques for garments and accessories (that I have little to no clue how to execute), there’s no good teacher like experience. And mending some fingertips on gloves should be easy enough. Or so I thought.
First Attempt
My first attempt at winging it was pretty alright at first. I saw a lot of mending videos on social media that demonstrated weaving a new patch on top of a hole. So I thought I could do that with a thread and needle.
I started with stitching a simple outline around the patch so that it could become the frame I would eventually weave from.
And you can see here that I started creating the horizontal weaves from the bottom. However, I quickly realized how tedious that would be for me. The glove was suede on one side, and the tear was right at the tip where it touched the suede. Weaving a patch around the suede would hurt my hands quickly.
And I think my thread was too thin for that kind of mending.
So I undid everything and started over.
And yes, I actually wore the glove while mending it. It’s probably not the best idea, but I was very careful not to poke myself (not recommended you try this yourself). I just couldn’t find a marker to fill the glove on such short notice.
Second Attempt
At this point, I felt called to the challenge of how I’d actually mend this glove and do a good job at it. Then, I remembered that another way you can mend holes is with a pre-made patch instead.
I wondered if I’d be able to do that with a piece of ribbon. I felt that the challenging part would be how to place the patch where it would be stable while sewing it on. The fingertip of a glove is very small, so pins and clips weren’t helpful here.
Looking at the gloves inside out, I realized that I could lean into how the glove was already made. I realized that it would be easier to work with the already existing seams, especially with the tough suede material on the front side.
I ended up stitching the ribbon patch right along the existing seam. I laid the patch on the side with the hole and stitched over the existing stitches. It was easy, since there were already holes to put my needle into.
Once the patch was secured enough, I flipped the glove inside out to secure the patch even further.
I first sewed an outline around the tear, so I could secure the patch with the intact fabric.
Then, I sewed along the tear to secure the patch and to mend the torn fabric.
Here are both of the gloves.
I learned a lot about mending with this project. I feel good that I was able to problem solve. And I hope this helps someone out there who may want to mend something that ended up being a bit more complicated than they thought. Some materials may seem too tough to sew through, but I’m sure there is a way.
Till next time, xo.