Visible Mending with Aurifil 12 wt Thread

For this month’s Aurifil Artisan Challenge we could choose: Visible Mending or Me Made May (clothing). Though I’m feeling the itch to get back to sewing clothes someday, this was not the day. 🙂

My daughter had asked me to patch up a pair of lightweight denim pants. They were well-loved and well-worn–with two large holes in the inner thigh area. She’d even tried her hand at sewing them up previously.

A perfect visible mending project! I really wanted the mend to hold, so I was able to find some similarly colored lightweight cotton denim from Art Gallery Fabrics in my stash. I cut two patches the same size (about 1/2″ larger than the holes on all sides), and then used some Steam-a-Seam 2 to fuse the patches to the pants.

I auditioned a few different colors of Aurifil 12 wt thread on hand–gray, variegated blue, and an off-white. I ultimately chose the gray to start.

Next, I turned to this book for some inspiration: Visible Mending: Artful Stitchery to Repair and Refresh Your Favorite Things by Jenny Wilding Cardon. I reviewed the book a couple of years ago.  

As is my style, I decided to start with a simple running stitch, I just marked it with a Frixion pen every 1/4″.

I use an embroidery needle to sew with the heavier 12 wt thread. I did just a simple running stitch through all the layers. It was a little thick–but totally doable.

I pretty quickly realized it needed a little “more” so I went back and added more stitching lines and decided to give the variegated thread a try.

At first I wasn’t sure I liked the unpredictability of the variegated, but after I ironed the pen marks off–I loved it!

I went with diagonal cross-hatching on the second patch and wished that I had used the variegated thread instead (regrets!).

I have to say that this type of mending is such a perfect thing to do outside during this crazy stressful time! It allowed me to be outside, doing some easy sewing while feeling like I was extending the life of some well-loved clothing.

I can’t recommend the book Visible Mending high enough–it was just the inspiration I needed! If you’ve never used a heavier thread, like Aurifil 12 wt. before–give it a try! I love the durability and stitch definition that it produces.

My daughter is very pleased with the results–you actually can hardly see this “visible” mend, but the pants are still comfortable to wear and will be used for years to come!