There are many ways to repair holes in your clothes. One of them is mending holes with Sashiko Stitches, a traditional Japanese method. The Japanese use it to reinforce their textiles, but here in the West we mainly use it in a decorative way. Although it also has a function of mending a hole of course!
Altogether, it’s a very nice and decorative way of visible mending. I think it really shows the love you have for your garment.

You can find many examples of Sashiko stitch patterns with the most beautiful motifs on the internet or Pinterest. Often they use very detailed and symmetrical patterns. In this example I used a cross stitch pattern to embroider the patch on my jeans, but of course you can do a different pattern if you like.

You Need:

– A scrap of fabric (not too thick)
– Fusible interfacing (vliesofix)
– Sashiko or Embroidery thread
– Needle (also not too thick)

How to sew on the patch

Here is how I stitched my patch onto my jeans, my way.
It’s certainly not the original Sashiko way “as it should be”, but that doesn’t matter. It is effective!
First, I always like to iron my patch over the hole with vliesofix (a double-sided fusible interfacing)
Vliesofix helps to keep your patch in place and it prevents fraying of the edges of the patch .

Do you want to embroider a pattern onto your patch?
Then you can first draw the pattern with a fabric marker before you start stitching. But I worked intuitively here 😉

How to Sashiko Stitch

– Cut a piece of sashiko/ embroidery thread, approximately the length of your arm. I split my embroidery-yarn so it wasn’t too thick. You can easily pull the embroidery thread apart, it consists of 6 threads and after splitting it consisted of 3.
– Start stitching on the side of the patch. Make a knot in the end of your yarn and pull the thread through the fabric from back to front. Start embroidering now.
– Make small stitches close together.
– Try to keep your work as flat as possible, do not pull your thread too hard, so the fabric doesn’t wrinkle.
– If you’ve used up your piece of thread, let it hang loose at the inside of the garment. You can finish it off later. Continue with a new piece of thread.
– Are you completely finished? Then weave in the loose threads on the back of the fabric. Weave them back and forth through the back of the stitches a few times and make a knot.
– Your hole has now been repaired in a nice and decorative way! And your pants (or jacket, etc) has got a second life 🙂

Read More:

• Mending with an Appliqué
• Invisible mending