Mend & Patch: A handbook to repairing clothes and textiles

by Kerstin Neumüller

Learn how to take care of your clothes by mending, patching, and repairing them, so you can extend the life of your most treasured garments.

In the farthest corner of her clothes store in Stockholm, Sweden, Kerstin has a mending studio. When it's quiet in the shop, she sits by her sewing machine and gives a new lease of life to people's favorite jeans. Whatever the wear and tear, Kerstin arms you with the skills and ideas you need to mend your own clothes and promote sustainable fashion. Find out emergency tips for mending in a hurry, enhance your clothes with decorative stitches, and learn to mend for and with different materials, including leather, cotton, wool, and denim. Packed full of simple fixes for sewing on buttons and repairing holes in pockets, as well as more advanced techniques like darning and weaving in new fabric, this book is perfect for sewers, crafters, and fashion lovers of all abilities.

Genres: Nonfiction, Sewing, Crafts, Reference, How To, Sustainability

128 pages, Paperback

Published October 1, 2019

Reviews

[Dav · Rating 4 out of 5]

Useful enough that I decided to buy a copy after returning to the library.

[Sonya · Rating 5 out of 5]

Fantastic little book with clear instructions to do all kinds of mending. Helped me to mend a pair of my son’s jeans this afternoon alone! Adding this to my “to buy” list.

[hope h. · Rating 4 out of 5]

informative, practical, and most of all, supremely european. very fun!

[Hollive · Rating 3 out of 5]

Of the three mending books I read, this was my favorite:
It covered visible and invisible mending techniques
It covered knits and wovens and leather
It had examples of common mends and tips for completing them successfully.

I wish the illustrations had been clearer, and I think most beginning menders will probably need some videos/additional pictures of the sewing stitches in action.

[Nick · Rating 5 out of 5]

Everyone repair your own textiles it's so rewarding and fun-- this book is a GREAT place to start.

[Deirdre · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a fun one! As I circle more and more into the zero-waste/ethical consumption life, I have begun to think more about the lifespan of my clothing. Really, the thing that happened was that my favourite pair of jeans gave out in a way I didn't know how to fix, and I thought, there is no time like now to learn how to mend better! I've known how to fix ripped seams and sew buttons and darn socks since I was a small one (thanks, Oma), but anything larger than that I never really felt competent.

This book focuses mostly on visible, hand-done mending via darning, patching, and ..overknitting? on woven and knitted textiles. I tend to want my mends to be less visible, but I enjoyed the way Neumüller made an art form of her visible mends, and I learned a lot about useful thread types. I am also now emboldened to take things apart at the seams in order to do big fixes, which I boggled at before.

Thanks, Neumüller!

[Irene Adler · Rating 5 out of 5]

A great book on assessing, repairing and caring for clothing.

If you are a curator of the clothing you wear, this is useful handbook. It covers both visible (currently fashionable) and invisible mending (could also be fashionable, how would you tell?).

Techniques include hand and machine mending, darning, and mending of knits and leather, so this book is more comprehensive than some. The range of repairs is from such as sewing on a button and removing lint / pilling (although with a razor, not for the faint-hearted) through to decorative reinforcing (eg sashiko mends) and grafting in of patches on knitwear.

I read it right through and I've been back to browse sections several times.

[Tyna · Rating 2 out of 5]

If I could have checked this out at the library I would not have purchased it because I have other books I find to be a lot more versatile for patch work. I do enjoy the pictures, colors and admire anyone who works with their hands so kudos to Kerstin though!
I like her advice about using a thimble on page 22 and I don't know why I can't seem to find one that really works with me. I do need to "persevere" as she says on thimble usage.
A chart of needle sizing would have helped me and I'm still looking for a good fabric glue. She has a picture of what she uses but it would have been nice if she had just named the brand. Her tube is wrinkled and upside-down.

[Elsabe Retief · Rating 4 out of 5]

Actually everyone should own this book. If we came as humans with instruction manuals - this information would be in it.
Practical and beautiful. Efficient and to the point.
What I liked most was the clear illustrated instructions on the difference between blanket stitch and buttonhole stitch.
Sashiko can get very convoluted in all it’s beauty and meaningfulness, here it is discussed reverently but concise.
Mending knitted items was an eyeopener and very well illustrated.

[Olivia · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is an excellent, but concise book on the basics of mending. The author assumes basic knowledge of sewing on the part of reader, and explains in detail how to mend various articles. I’ve been sewing most of my life, but was never taught to mend items. Some I’ve figured out on my own, others I’ve had difficulty making it look the way I want. I’d highly recommend this book as a practical resource before moving on to the more artistic visible mending books.

[Lorre · Rating 3 out of 5]

Interesting book about the art of visible mending.

The great thing about this book is that it's not only mending with a sewing machine but also by hand. I can't sew with a sewing machine even if my life depended on it but I am really good at making nice, even stitches by hand. So having chapters exclusively dedicated to mending by hand is super!

[Tariques · Rating 3 out of 5]

2.5 stjärnor
Vackra bilder, men tyvärr väldigt bristfälliga instruktioner och illustrationer.
Större fokus på dekorationer och mönster än själva lagningarna. Den som gillar synliga lagningar kommer att gilla boken mer än jag gjorde.
Konstiga särskrivningar i hela boken.
Uppskattade kapitlet om lädervård, då detta har saknats från andra liknande böcker jag läst.

[Leah Levitt · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is not only great for saving our clothes rather than throwing them out, but it is of value to fiber artists in general because it shows many useful stitches and beautiful stitching patterns. It covers patching, darning, reinforcing thin areas, and sweater mending. The patterns are beautiful.

[Karla · Rating 5 out of 5]

A very beautiful book for anyone who loves textiles, and a very efficient way to learn to repair and maintain a wide variety of garments. I am now looking through my wardrobe for clothing to mend! I am very curious to try Swiss darning!

[Isabelle · Rating 5 out of 5]

Very useful and practical advice

[Beki · Rating 2 out of 5]

Some nice designs but quite simple. Not what I was personally looking for

[Kate · Rating 4 out of 5]

Good array of methods of mending.

[Malicia Swan · Rating 5 out of 5]

Très pratique, plein d'astuces et de techniques bien expliquées et illustrées.

[ALM · Rating 5 out of 5]

Contains some of the best tutorials out there, with well-written explanations and good photography.

[Sarah · Rating 4 out of 5]

A little more advanced, and would have loved more diagrams and pictures for some of the projects. But the section on darning and repairing knits is the best I've seen so far. A helpful guide.

[Kathleen · Rating 3 out of 5]

Helpful ideas for mending, but the instructions are a little sparse.

[Peta · Rating 5 out of 5]

A simple to use beautifully put together book.

[Julia · Rating 5 out of 5]

really useful and down-to-earth book on visibly mending clothing and fabric, with lovely photos. I borrowed it from my local library, then found a copy to purchase as a reference book.

[Tessa · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book has some good info which is good because my baby poured a cup of water on my library copy so now I own it lol.

[Aneesa · Rating 2 out of 5]

It's not very detailed and a lot of the instructions are vauge or just not very clear.
Not really and good for beginners or anybody wanting to learn about mending.

[Mary Dubberly · Rating 5 out of 5]

Thoughtfully organised, nicely designed, super-useful.

[Wolfram-Jaymes Keesing · Rating 3 out of 5]

I mean, as long as it does what it says it does, how could you hate a reference book? Relevant to my interests, which is why I picked it up. And a ton of useful info from professional menders about everyday repairs. This knowledge will totally come in handy.

[Tam G · Rating 4 out of 5]

Great resource for darning, patching, and mending. Lots of techniques and ideas condensed into 1-2 pages. Probably one of the 2 best I've read so far.

[Laroy Viviane · Rating 5 out of 5]

Voilà un indispensable à avoir dans sa bibliothèque si vos grand-mères ne sont plus là pour vous transmettre leurs techniques. Et ce livre propose en plus des techniques de rapiéçage et de broderie japonaise, qui sublime le racommodage.