Meaningful mending

Meaningful mending

By Erin May-Bartlett

I was inspired by traditional Indian and Japanese mending techniques called Sashiko and Kantha to recreate this 19th century servant’s garment. I wanted to show how mending can be a fun way to express yourself and make your clothes unique and meaningful to you, while also helping the environment! The techniques I have used are easy to learn and you can make them bright and eye catching.

When you look at the servant’s garment you can see very clearly where it has been patched and mended with fabrics that don’t quite match. This jacket has stories that I will never know, but although the person who wore this may be forgotten, those patches tell some of the story of who they were, what they did and how they lived. 

In the past, mending your clothes was sometimes seen as shameful, because people were embarrassed that they didn’t have enough money for new clothing. What happens when you rip a hole in your jeans or the elbow of your jacket wears through? Well, of course you could mend them subtly and try to hide it, but that isn’t really my style. 

On my mini mannequin, I have made a tiny version of the original jacket - but there is a difference! Instead of trying to blend in the holes and patches, I was inspired by traditional mending techniques from India and Japan called Kantha and Sashiko. These techniques use a simple running stitch to layer fabrics to make them stronger. They can also be used to mend things. I chose orange as it is my favourite colour so used the mending to express myself and made the jacket personal to me. I used small fabric scraps left over from things that were important to me - the pink fabric with little hearts is from my baby blanket, the purple spiral fabric is from the first quilt I ever made, and the orange and teal fabric is from a pair of trousers that I loved so much I wore them until they completely fell apart. 

Some of these patches I put on top of the worn places, some I put underneath so that they would peek through the holes. Over the top I took some contrasting-coloured thread and stitched lots of lines and patterns. This made the mended section extra strong and you can make any pattern you like!