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Darn it! How our ancestors lovingly mended their clothing and how we mend today

September 27, 2018 By Julia 2 Comments

In this blog, we will let the photos speak for themselves. We always enjoy and admire finding beautiful and often tiny little repairs in the textiles we care for, so we thought you would too!

By Kaitlyn Munro

Repair in baby cap.

Christening gown

An American flag from the 1860’s

Darning in handkerchiefs

Young ladies would practice their darning skills with samplers such as this one we worked on from DAR:

https://collections.dar.org/RediscoveryProficioPublicSearch/ShowImageView.aspx?16090+objects

Some darning techniques

Today there is a new trend called visible mending which focuses on repairing holes in an artistic way. If you are on Instagram, do a search and scroll through #visiblemending for a colorful feast of repairs.

Filed Under: News

Comments

  1. Simone Fitzgibbon says

    September 28, 2018 at 12:03 am

    How interesting! Thank you for sharing.

    Reply
  2. Tess says

    September 29, 2018 at 3:32 pm

    Love the modern take on darning that showcases the artistry of the mender.

    Reply

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