How to Mend Clothes: A Make-Do-and-Mend Guide for Beginners

Clothes repair used to be a normal household skill, not a niche hobby. During the Second World War, with clothes rationed from 1941, the Board of Trade ran a whole campaign called Make Do and Mend, complete with a cheery cartoon guide named Mrs Sew-and-Sew, teaching people to darn, patch and remake what they already owned. That thrifty spirit is worth borrowing. Not out of hardship this time, but because keeping a jumper you love going for another five years is a small, quiet win. Here's how to start.

What goes in a basic mending kit?

You don't need much, and you probably have half of it in a drawer already. A simple kit will handle the vast majority of repairs.

• Hand-sewing needles in a few sizes. A pack of "sharps" for everyday fabric, plus a couple of larger, blunt-tipped darning needles for wool.
• Thread to match. A small set of polyester threads in the colours you actually wear (black, white, navy, grey, a beige) covers most of your wardrobe. Add a little wool or darning yarn for socks and knits.
• A thimble. Feels old-fashioned until the day you push a needle through thick denim and it saves your fingertip.
• Small, sharp scissors. Embroidery scissors or snips. Keep them for thread only, because cutting paper blunts them fast.
• Pins and a few safety pins to hold things still while you stitch.
• A darning mushroom or darning egg. A smooth, rounded tool you slip under a hole to hold the fabric taut while you weave across it.

That's it. A little tin or a biscuit box keeps it together so you're not hunting for a needle when a button pops ten minutes before you leave the house.

Which hand stitches are actually worth knowing?

Four. That's all you really need to handle nearly every repair in this guide, and each one takes about a minute to learn.

Running stitch is the simplest: you push the needle up and down through the fabric in a neat, dotted line, taking several stitches onto the needle at once before pulling through. It's quick, and it's the workhorse of patching and visible mending. It isn't the strongest, though, so keep it for jobs that won't take much strain.

Backstitch is the strong one. You take a stitch forward, then go back to meet the end of the last stitch, so the line is solid and unbroken underneath with no gaps. Use it anywhere that pulls: seams, waistbands, the top of a pocket. If a repair needs to hold, backstitch is your friend.

Whip stitch loops over an edge, catching two layers together with small diagonal stitches. It's handy for closing a stuffed toy, tacking down a patch edge, or stopping a fraying seam from getting worse.

Slip stitch, also called ladder stitch, is the clever one. Worked from the folded edges of two pieces of fabric, it hides the thread inside the fold so the seam closes almost invisibly from the outside. This is what you reach for on a hem or a seam where you don't want the stitches to show.

Learn four stitches and you've covered nine repairs out of ten. The rest is just practice and a bit of patience.

How do you sew on a button so it actually stays?

The classic. A button that falls off within a week was sewn on flat and tight, with no room for the fabric of the buttonhole side to sit underneath. The fix is a little "shank" of thread under the button that gives it breathing room.

1. 1

   Thread and knot

   Cut about 40cm of thread, thread the needle and bring the ends together so you're sewing double for strength. Knot the two ends together.

2. 2

   Anchor the spot

   Push the needle up from the back of the fabric to where the button sits, and take a tiny stitch to lock it in place.

3. 3

   Add a spacer

   Lay a matchstick, cocktail stick or spare pin across the top of the button, between the holes. This holds the gap that becomes your thread shank.

4. 4

   Stitch through the holes

   Sew up through one hole and down through the next, over the spacer, four or five times per pair of holes. On a four-hole button make an X or two parallel bars, whichever you prefer.

5. 5

   Build the shank

   Slide the spacer out, lift the button so the threads pull taut, and wind the thread firmly around them six or so times to make a neat little stalk under the button.

6. 6

   Finish off

   Push the needle through to the back, make two or three small stitches over each other to lock it, and snip the thread close.

That shank is the secret. It lets the button sit up off the fabric so the cloth can tuck under it comfortably, and it spreads the strain so the button doesn't tear back out.

How do you fix a popped seam or a fallen hem?

A split seam looks alarming and is one of the easiest fixes going. The stitching has simply given way while the fabric is fine. Turn the garment inside out, line up the two edges along the original seam line, and pin. Then work backstitch along the gap, starting a centimetre or so before the hole and finishing a centimetre past it so you're anchoring into sound stitching at both ends. Keep close to the original seam so the shape doesn't change. Backstitch here because a seam takes strain every time you move.

A fallen hem, where the bottom of a pair of trousers or a skirt has come loose and is flapping, is a job for slip stitch. Fold the hem back up to its original crease and pin it. Working from the inside, catch just a thread or two of the outer fabric with each stitch, then run the needle along inside the fold of the hem before catching the next thread. Done gently, the stitches vanish from the outside and only you know the hem was ever down. Don't pull tight, or you'll get little puckers on the front.

How do you darn a hole in a sock or jumper?

Darning is the one that sounds like witchcraft and turns out to be simple weaving. Instead of covering a hole, you rebuild the missing fabric by laying down threads and weaving across them, so you end up with a small woven patch that's part of the garment.

Slip your darning mushroom under the hole so the fabric domes over it, held taut but not stretched to bursting. Then:

First, work a few rows of running stitch in the good fabric all around the hole, to stop it spreading and give you an anchor. Next, lay a set of parallel threads straight across the hole in one direction, going a little way into the sound fabric at each end. These are your "warp" threads, like the strings of a tiny loom. Keep them close but not crammed.

Then comes the weaving. Turn ninety degrees and go back and forth across those first threads, passing the needle over one, under the next, over, under, all the way across. On the return row, do the opposite: under where you went over, over where you went under. Row by row you fill the hole with a new little piece of woven cloth. Don't pull the threads tight; let them lie so the mend stays soft and stretchy.

For a jumper, the idea is identical, just use wool close to the weight of the knit so the darn moves with the garment. Your first darn will look homemade. That's completely fine, and by the third one you'll be rather pleased with yourself.

When should you patch instead of darn?

For bigger holes and tears in woven fabric, especially high-wear spots like jeans at the knee, a patch is stronger and quicker than darning.

Iron-on patches are the fast route. You cut the patch a good bit larger than the hole, position it, and press it on with a hot iron following the packet instructions. Brilliant for a quick save, though they can peel at the edges over time, so a few stitches round the edge afterwards makes them last.

Sewn patches are the sturdier option. Cut a piece of fabric larger than the hole and slip it behind the tear from the inside, or lay it on top if you want it to show. Pin it, then stitch it down all around with running stitch or backstitch, and add a few rows straight across the hole itself to reinforce the weak spot. On jeans, denim or sturdy cotton makes the best patch because it can take the same punishment as the trousers.

Do you have to hide a repair? An intro to visible mending

Here's the cheering modern twist. You don't have to make a mend disappear at all. Visible mending does the opposite, treating the repair as decoration, and it's become a proper craft in its own right.

The best-known style borrows from Japan. Sashiko, which roughly means "little stabs", is a running-stitch technique traditionally worked in white thread on indigo cloth, building up neat rows and patterns. Layer patches and sashiko stitching over years and you get boro, the beautiful, much-mended textiles Japanese farming families passed down. You can borrow the idea on a torn knee or a worn elbow: pin a contrasting patch behind the hole, then cover the area with rows of running stitch in a colour you like. It reinforces the fabric and looks intentional.

Decorative darning works the same way. Instead of matching the yarn, use a bright contrast so your neat woven patch becomes a little burst of colour on a grey sock. A worn elbow becomes a deliberate feature. Nobody looks at a visibly mended jumper and thinks "poor them"; they think "where did you get that". It's the make-do-and-mend spirit with the shame taken out, and it turns a chore into something you actually want to do. Start with one repair, keep the clothes you love, and you'll wonder why you ever binned anything. For more thrifty know-how, browse the rest of our Homestead Skills.