Dina Climatiano

A few weeks ago my parents came to visit. They, of course, came bearing gifts. It was Christmas after all… My mother had given me a beautiful red Columbia coat. Not three days after, I managed to rip the right pocket climbing out of the car to go to a Christmas market. Because of course I did.

“Not to worry,” I said. “There’s a seamstress in the neighborhood. I’ll have it good as new in no time!”

Except the seamstress is no longer there (I think the pandemic was rough on her). Now… I could have found another seamstress of course, but what fun would that be? Nah, we’re all about picking up useful (-ish) skills in this house.

I made a lot of impulsive crafty purchases in the last few days. One of those was a proper sewing kit. I looked at the ripped pocket of my beautiful red coat and decided today’s creativity exercise will be another one of the errand variety.

I was going to sew the bastard back on.

Now, I am a decent enough button sewer (yes, that is the word!).

I can mend simple rips functionally enough. They look awful, but you cannot say they’re ripped anymore.

And over the years my mother has tried several times to teach me how to take in the hem on pants, but to no avail. I never had the patience or the skill, and it was always a problem best solved by someone else for no more than 15 euros.

Sewing machines always intimidated me. With my luck, I’d sooner stab my finger repeatedly than produce a decent-looking garment.

but I figured “nah… it’s just a ripped pocket, surely I don’t need a sewing machine!”

So I took the coat in my hand, picked out a thread that looked close enough in color, chose a needle and… Realized I don’t know what I’m doing.

Like, at all.

Questions kept popping up in my mind.

How much string do I even need? How am I going to stitch inside the pocket? Should I be pushing the needle through all the layers of the coat? Wouldn’t that ruin the coat’s impermeability? Can I even sew it in securely without touching the inner layers? What kind of stitch do I use? How many different kinds are there?

“Focus on the problem in front of you,” I cautioned.

“Youtube!” I thought. “Surely someone out there has a tutorial on this exact problem!”

Yes, you would think that, wouldn’t you? But all the pockets I saw mended looked nothing like mine, half of them did use a sewing machine (and suggested outrageous things like taking out the lining and putting it back in again??? Ain’t nobody got time for that!) and a lot of them I could barely understand. I respect seamstresses and admire what they do, but at least the ones making tutorials on Youtube don’t seem to prioritize user friendliness…

So I did the next best thing: I went on a sewing internet rabbit-hole, looking for something to teach me the basics so I can craft my own solution. And find it I did. Not on Youtube, Skillshare to the rescue again, but surprisingly it was by a Youtuber I have been following for quite a while. The course is called Hand Sewing Basics: Work Wonders with Fabric, Needle & Thread by Bernadette Banner. She’s a fashion historian and I highly recommend you check out her channel.

Anyway, the next few hours looked like this:

Suffice it to say I will not be fixing that pocket today.

Now I know what you’re thinking, because I’m thinking it too.

“You can’t finish anything, can you?”

Well, no, not when my initial plan proves to be a tad too ambitious… But hey, I can make 5 different types of terrible stitches!

And I have a half baked strategy for how to go about fixing that pocket. Worry not, it involves A LOT of practice on rags I don’t care about beforehand.

I call that a win.