Distressed clothing tag from vintage pants.

How to Repair Used Clothing: A Little Too Preloved - Easy and Fast Repair Ideas

Vintage clothing is often far from like-new condition. That being said a large percentage of vintage clothing is immediately wearable without the need for repairs or any maintenance before use, but the expert or at least highly involved vintage shopper will find pieces they absolutely want but come with issues to remedy. The guides available to you are complex and require skill with a needle or extra materials and patience. What if you do not want to wait, what if you do not know how to sew, what if you are lazy, what if you would rather destroy than repair, well then here is your simple yet effective guide of how to repair clothing in perfectly imperfect manners.

Key Takeaways:

Sandpaper small holes or stains to remove unwanted marks or to extrapolate upon issues that wear once defects, make small holes into well placed rips.

Dye or bleach clothing with severe color distress or clothing that has large stains that have set into the fabric or are splattered over the article of clothing. Bleaching the garment will result in a new take, a new look at the design of the clothing and in most cases will make old or poorly maintained clothes usable again. Breathe life into damaged clothes.

Tailor garments that are of nice quality and material, but of the wrong size or shape. Jeans, trousers, jackets, shirts, almost any article of clothing can be customized to your body. If you love a jacket you find online or on a rack near you, but the size is a off or the style of the fit of a vintage piece is old-fashioned or awkward - you do not have to give up on the garment. Tailoring pieces of clothing will make your closet full of gems. A well-tailored piece is better than any stock clothing article.

I know this was supposed to be completely user friendly, but a simple youtube video of how to stitch a hole shut should suffice for this step. And the feeling of satisfaction in fixing your own clothes is worth something. Sew holes or rips closed. Sew patchwork over distress or signs of wear. Sewing allows you to customize pieces and salvage garments that have been subject to wear and tear. Not all vintage is in mint condition, and the garments that are in mint condition are either highly expensive or the piece was not that cool to start with - considering how no one ever chose to wear it. No sewing machine required, a simple stitching kit will suffice and based on the design of the clothing you can choose to use matching thread or extra fabric or create a stitch that pops. A dash of imperfection makes for great fun on a vintage garment.

There were only four, if I go any further the guide will lose its ever so vital point. So take care, change some clothes, alter some vintage garments and do not let wear and tear scare you away from a cheap cool vintage find.