Patching Clothes - Printable Version +- Makestation (https://makestation.net) +-- Forum: Area 52 (https://makestation.net/forumdisplay.php?fid=58) +--- Forum: General Discussion (https://makestation.net/forumdisplay.php?fid=36) +--- Thread: Patching Clothes (/showthread.php?tid=3547)

Patching Clothes - SpookyZalost - May 13th, 2021 One of the more useful skills I picked up when learning to sew patches onto my patch/pin jackets is hand sewing, and specifically a few useful basic hand sewing techniques which can also be used to repair wear and tear on clothes which tends to happen as you use them over time thus extending their lifespan. So hand sewing in a nutshell is feeding thread through the eye of a needle and tying it off, I personally like to fold mine in half and tie off the end with a quad knot which acts as a stopper since it's bigger than the needle. once you do that it's the process of feeding the needle through cloth or other materials with the thread following through after it. once you get some practice at sewing patches onto clothes or bits of cloth together you can move onto different sewing techniques. at the start you'll pick up the straight stitch, it's your basic over under over under sewing and is good for holding something in place but not for permanence. for patch sewing or closing rips and tears a simple spiral stitch is effective. basically for clothes just turn your shirt or pants inside out, put the two pieces either together or side by side and move through them in a spiral pattern pulling everything closed, this technique btw can also be used for closing wounds and it's often employed by doctors and nurses. basically you're spiraling the thread in and out of the surface over one direction then under the opposite way while moving forward along the line. Another useful stitch to know is the zigzag stitch. basically you go across diagonally, go backwards underneath then up and diagonally across again, then backwards under, then repeat along the line. it's called a zigzag stitch because it makes a zigzag line but looks like sets of X's on the one side and back and forth dashes on the other, like a zig zag cross. as you go along make sure to pull everything taut as well to have a firm hold.  the spiral stitch is good for stiff sections while the zigzag can stretch a bit while maintaining integrity. and of course tie a knot at the end to secure everything once you have it all done. this can all be done with a sewing machine of course but hand sewing is useful because you can carry a small sewing kit with you anywhere, I keep one in the satchel I carry with me everywhere just in case I either need to repair my clothes... or in the very rare chance, myself. (warning on using this info for medical reasons, make sure you treat the thread with alcohol first and heat up the needle to kill any germs, if you can superglue is an alternative and was literally invented for sealing wounds.)