Why Mending?

Visual Mending is an act of rebellion against Fast Fashion and throw away culture. It is an expression of defiance against an endless cycle of “buy, wear, throw out, repeat”. 

Mending is metaphorical and concrete, creative and sustainable. It’s easy to start, fun and offers endless possibilities to transform of your wardrobe while sending a strong message. 

If mending was a language, think of it as a universal one. Every culture uses needle and threat. It has been essential to the human experience for thousands of years. 

The weaver constructs, the sewer combines, the menders repair.

Visual Mending

The same skills that are needed to join fabric through sewing and express culture and personal preferences through embroidery. Sewing, mending and embroidery are closely related and one skill informs the others.

Learn a few stitches. If mending was a language, stitches would be the first sounds you learn. You can express a lot one or two, but 5 is ideal, they make you look like an embroidery artist!

My favorite five are: running stitch, back stitch, blanket stitch, chain stitch and the super pretty herringbone stitch.

The art is in how to combine them. With practice comes fluency and after a short while you might choose to add more and more stitches. There are textile artists who only use one or two stitches. The art lies in how to combine them. 

There are a few useful principles to understand the physics of material and tools, but there are few rules and many reveal themselves while you experiment.

Which brings us to rule number 1.

Rule # 1: Experiment, experiment, experiment. Find your own “stitch voice” and then experiment more. Find your voice again and again.

Rule # 2: Be nice to yourself. Take pauses. Don’t look up menders who have been mending since they were 10 years old after learning the skill from their mother and grandmother. 

Rule # 3: Share your stitches and celebrate! You will notice that your hands will be too busy to snack much, but now is the moment for a toast. And if you can, look for a group of menders and join forces.

Mending is even much fun, when skills and stories are shared.

You will always be welcome there.